GIFT  OF 


EARLIER  POEMS 


REGINALD  C.  ROBBINS 


CAMBRIDGE 

at  W$ 

1916 


COPYRIGHT,   1913,  BY  REGINALD  CHAUNCEY  ROBBINS 
ALL  RIGHTS  RESERVED 


GIFT 


CONTENTS 

I.    POEMS  OF  APPRECIATION        ...  I 

ON  CERTAIN  GOSPEL  PAINTINGS .                .  J 

AN   "AUTOUR  DU  BERCEAU  "       ...  6 

A  "DEAD  MONK"     ....       ..        .  8 

A  MADONNA  OF  DEL  SARTO .        ...  9 

APOTHEOSIS         .        .....        .        .  12 

A  MEMORIAL .  14 

SUFFERANCE        .        ...        ...  16 

"MARL-E  NASCENTI"        .        .        .      ".        .I/ 

KARNAK.     .......        .        .        .        .  20 

THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS  AT  THEBES     .  23 

ABU  SIMBEL 2$ 

THE  SCULPTURES  OF  ABU  SIMBEL,  WITHIN  27 

KERRERI 30 

"OH,  TO  WHOM?"        .     .  *       *       .        .  32 

A  DIALOGUE 35 

MELOSPIZA .38 


ill 


424544 


CONTENTS 

II.    POEMS  OF  NATURE 41 

MID-MAY 43 

SPIRIT 47 

SOUL 5! 

WHITSUNTIDE 53 

SPRING-MOON 56 

QUIET .  58 

FORCE 60 

MIDSUMMER 63 

MORTMAIN 67 

NOON 69 

MARSH-MUSIC 71 

A  CEREMONIAL  VERSE 73 

CONSECRATION 77 

RESIGNATION 80 

THE  BARBARIANS 82 

HIEMATION 87 

UNDER  GLASS 91 

THE  GARDEN  OF  THE  GULF  ....  97 


IV 


CONTENTS 

III.    POEMS  PSYCHOLOGICAL  .       .       .       .  101 

THE  SWIMMER  .  .  .  .  »  •  •  103 
CARRION  .-.-'.••.  .  .  .  .105 

THE  NOVICE 108 

THE  VIOLINIST  .        .        .        .       .        .        .HI 

ONE  WAY  OF  GRIEF       ...        .        .11$ 

THE  HERMIT 1 19 

AN  ORNITHOLOGIST 123 

AN  ASTRONOMER 127 

THE  DIVORCED  .  .  ,  .  /  .131 
A  CANDIDATE  FOR  COMMITTAL.  .  .136 
THE  CONVALESCENT  .  .  .  .  .142 

THE  BLOCKADER 1 52 

THE  PATROL l62 

A  DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY        .        .        .173 
A  HORTICULTURIST.        .....   184 

THE  PRIMA  DONNA 195 


EARLIER  POEMS 


POEMS  OF  APPRECIATION 


ON  CERTAIN  GOSPEL  PAINTINGS 

THE  story  of  an  alien  race ;  minute, 

Painstaking  portraiture  of  Syrian,  Jew, 

Greek,  Arab,  Roman  :  if  a  tragedy, 

Yet  strange  ;  if  an  apotheosis,  still 

Too  fleshly  (ay,  too  blood-stain 'd)  to  believe!  — 

Has  it  become  but  this  ?    That  saviorship 

Saved,  then,  the  world  a  scant  two  thousand  years ; 

Not  now  nor  yet  tomorrow  ?  Yesterday 

Was  Christ  Christ;  and  today  but  Joseph's  son  ? 

Just  people  painted  :  these  are  thieves ;  and  he 

A  malefactor !    Nay,  no  paradise 

Nor  thin  transfiguration  spoils  the  spell 

Of  sweat  and  dust ;  of  some  mere  agony 

Of  wasted  passion,  of  a  thwarted  soul 

At  best  but  disillusion 'd.   And  the  poor, 

Deluded,  disappointed  Semite  folk 

Turn  back  to  toil  with  heavy  heart,  take  up 

Alone  and  wholly  comfortless  the  grim, 

Interminable  burden.   That  is  all ; 

Just  people  painted  :  an  intense,  sweet  life 

3 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Crush'd  out  and  ended  ;  and  a  discontent 
Where  had  been  undemurring  drudgery. 

Just  people  painted.  — Slightly  from  the  shore 

A  boat  becalm'd,  with  silent  fisher-folk 

Silently  fishing  ;  and  an  azure  sky 

Quiet  above  the  boat,  and  underneath, 

A  quiet,  azure  water ;  and  about, 

A  pasture-land  ;  and,  lo  !  a  little  town 

At  peace  and  undemurring :  all  is  quite 

In  the  world  as  though  there  had  not  been  a  son 

To  Joseph  nor  to  Mary.  And,  behold  ! 

There  stands  upon  the  shore  alone,  unseen, 

Mary's  and  Joseph's  son.   And  all  the  world 

(He  sees  and  knows)  is  as  if  he,  a  man, 

Had  never  been :  his  agony,  his  life 

So  tragic-true,  saving  men  yesterday ; 

Not  now,  nor  yet  tomorrow  !    And  in  that 

Unspoken  and  unspeakable  despair 

He  calls  or  seems  to  call ;  is  seen  or  seems 

So  to  be  seen  quiet  upon  the  shore 

With  earnest  beckoning.   And  they  becalm'd 


ON   CERTAIN   GOSPEL  PAINTINGS 

Start  up  from  fishing ;  for  they  seem  to  see. 

It  is  the  story  of  an  alien  race  ; 

A  folk  whose  human  tragedy  endured 

To  save  men's  souls  a  scant  two  thousand  years  ; 

Not  now,  nor  yet  tomorrow.   Shall  the  world 

Be  as  though  yesterday  had  never  been  ? 


AN  "AUTOUR  DU  BERCEAU" 

WERE  it  not  for  the  angel  in  the  place, 

The  place  were  so  forlorn  :  a  chamber,  cold, 

Low,  rough  and  scantly  cumber'd  ;  here  a  stool, 

Yonder  the  settle,  and  in  homeliest  sort 

The  mother's  mattress,  cradle  for  the  babe  : 

Beyond  these,  nothing.    Only,  of  the  bed 

A  woman,  worn  and  weak  almost  to  death  ; 

Of  the  crib  a  weanling  scarce  with  strength  of  life 

Yet,  but  with  potency  to  wax  and  grow 

Big  to  the  father's  frame  he  has  not  seen 

Nor  e'er  may  know  save  she  shall,  point  by  point, 

Mould  the  babe  to  be  manly  as  was  once 

Her  man  and  guardian  of  the  house.   But  she 

Can  nothing  of  herself ;  can  scarcely  live 

A  little  ;  much  less,  lend  of  life.   And,  were 

These  all  that  fill'd  the  place,  ay,  how  forlorn  ! 

Yet,  to  the  nature  of  the  need,  is  come 
An  angel  in  the  house.   An  utmost  need  — 
And  he  is  there,  busied  about  the  babe 


AN   "AUTOUR  DU   BERCEAU " 

Beseemingly.   She  is  too  sick  to  say  : 

"  Sir,  spare  us ;  render  your  benignity 

Where  is  more  worth."    Nor  had  she  dream'd  to  urge 

Of  heaven  such  aid  august.   She  lies  there  now 

By  very  reason  of  her  need  of  help 

Quietly,  awfully  accepting  so 

The  ministry  ;  one  hand  by  force  of  love, 

Even  despite  the  fever,  raised  (the  least) 

In  mother-motion  toward  the  babe.   And  he, 

The  babe,  too  young  to  question  whence  the  care 

If  supernature's,  or  the  world's  right  way, 

Croons,  as  't  would  seem,  with  somewhat  which  can 

touch 

Sick  ears  to  sympathy.  And  so  she  lies 
Her  lids  just  lifted  to  that  light  between 
The  white  wings.  — 

It  were  so  forlorn  a  place 
Were  not  the  angel  there.   But  need  is  hers 
And  love  —  and  he  is  there ;  and  shall  be  there 
In  the  house  of  love.   For  such  were  ne'er  forlorn. 


A  "DEAD  MONK" 

SO,  he  has  triumph'd.   This  is  his  reward. 
Thus  shall  the  triumph  ever  be.   And  thus 
Be  the  reward.  —  Mark  the  grim  jaws  that  lock'd 
To  bar  world's  bread  out.    Lo !  the  inward  lids 
And  beetling  fore-brow,  hard-drawn,  glooming  down 
To  screen  sight  from  earth's  seeming  —  all  with  aim 
To  cheat  earth  at  the  last  and  leave  with  her 
Nothing  of  manhood.   Ay,  for  nothing  earth's 
Nor  man's  remain'd  to  die  out  of  this  corpse. 
This  is  earth's,  man's  revenge  ;  that  here  remains 
Nought  worth  commemoration.   Could  a  sense 
Screen'd  from  earth's  seeming  pierce  these  shows  of 

things 

To  earth-hood  and  be  manhood  that  remains 
A  memorable  presence  ?  Could  he  be 
Immortal,  all  whose  life  expected  death  ? 


A  MADONNA  OF  DEL  SARTO 

'But  still  the  other's  Virgin  was  bis  wife' 

NAY,  there  is  nought  more  holy  in  the  world 

Than  this  her  motherhood  :  no  mystery, 

Miraculous  dispensation  ;  none  the  less 

Divine  in  wrapt  acceptance  of  the  truth. 

Hers,  no  mere  ignorance  of  woes  to  come, 

Nor  yet  reluctance ;  but  a  soft  acclaim 

For  boundless  possibility  to  be 

Sponsor  to  man's  extremest  sacrifice  : 

For  any  sacrifice  in  absolute  peace 

(With  scarce  appeal  for  recompense  to  God  !) 

Her  mother's  soul  may  earn  of  her  man-child. 

She  would  not  so  deny  divinity 

As  to  forswear  man-child  for  born  of  man. 

She  would  not  need  a  heaven,  who,  at  the  cross 

As  now,  would  wear  still  the  same  sober  grace 

For  wisdom  that  our  worldhood  is  divine. — 

Here  is  it  shown  me,  this  so  holy  thing 

Of  motherhood.   Here  will  I  sit  and  seek 

To  fathom  it ;  and  learn  thee,  O  Andrea  ! 


EARLIER   POEMS 

She  was  thy  wife,  we  know.   Yet  much  of  this 
Thou  gavest.   Seem'd  she  like  this,  then,  to  thee  ? 

Think  !  a  man's  wife  may  be  madonna  too, 

Both  truths  in  one  love  !  —  Raphael  had  none 

Such  intimate  insight ;  for  he  had  no  wife, 

Could  paint  Madonna  only.   Titian,  haply, 

Achieved  too  loftily  to  learn  a  truth 

So  humbly  holy.   Michelangelo 

Knew  thousand  shapes  of  mightiness  ;  his  strength 

Was  desperate,  glorious  more  than  motherly. 

Rubens  ?  There  's  scarce  one  pose  of  all  but  smacks 

Of  some  vulgarity.   Murillo  fain 

Had  painted  this  thou  paintedst,  O  Andrea  ! 

The  rest  are  round  about  thee.    Thou  hast  found 

Even  in  thy  forthright,  plain  presentment  homely 

Of  this  thou  knowest,  nimbus'd  by  thy  great, 

Kind,  twilight,  pitying  soul  with  immanence 

Of  adumbration  :  thou  hast  spoken  the  love 

Without  sin  and  the  spirit  incarnated 

Nor  Titian,  Raphael,  nay,  Angelico 

Had  more  than  symbolized.  —  Did  they  believe 


10 


A  MADONNA  OF  DEL  SARTO 

Theirs  were  no  symbols  ?  Ah !  but  now  the  signs 

Have  need  of  explanation  ;  so  are  false. 

What  now  the  Virgin-Birth  ?  What  angel  came 

To  Mary  yearning  ?  Who  might  mean  he  saw 

Aught  womanly  ascend  into  the  clouds  ? 

And  what  their  import  were  these  facts  approved  ? 

But  one  truth  speaks  which  these  mere  signs  would 

show; 

One  Mother-of-God  there  is,  each  newest  hour 
A  woman  realizes  (not  with  fear  — 
With  glad  assumption  of  the  privilege  !) 
That  hers  is  for  another  infinite  life 
To  offer  infinite  life ;  and  be  divine 
In  being  motherly.   This,  O  Andrea, 
Is  thine :  thy  wife ;  so,  thy  madonna  too ! 


II 


APOTHEOSIS 

A  LEGEND  OF  THE  PAINTING  BUDDHA 

"  MAJESTY  !  —  by  your  pardon  !  —  courtiers  all, 

My  critics  !  much  is  it  of  grief  to  me 

Through  your  dissatisfaction  ;  yet  not  anger, 

Envy  nor  malice  in  me  that  I  learn 

Your  loftier  lights  than  mine ;  but  loneliness 

Where  least  I  seem'd  alone.   This  scene  which  suits 

You,  Majesty,  and  you,  critics,  so  ill ; 

This  forest-park,  this  foliaged  tracery 

Of  twining  boughs  and  moss  and  cool-sluiced  brooks, 

This  green  and  garden'd  sanctuary;  made  I 

Of  paint  from  pallet  that  therein  I  might 

As  in  an  own  particular  paradise 

Delight,  with  you,  through  you ;  and  that  therein 

My  spirit,  god-like,  leaving  at  its  death 

This  patient  tenement,  in  such  abode, 

Yea,  in  this  very  painted  plash  and  plume 

Of  cold  brook  and  of  whispering  pine,  should  bide 

Eternally  as  in  Nirvana.   These 

I  made  ;  who  feel  a  soul-sufficiency 

12 


APOTHEOSIS 

Even  in  this  scene  which  suits  you,  sirs,  so  ill  — 
Mine  own  particular  paradise  !   I  grieve 
But  that  alone,  untenanted  of  you 
These  groves  receive  me  so  in  singleness ; 
Me  dead  to  man's  less-world  I  fain  had  loved : 
A  God  !  — By  pardon,  Majesty,  I  take 
Farewell  now ;  enter  into  and  enjoy 
Nirvana ;  feel  this  art-world  I  have  made, 
Truth  of  mine  everlasting  being.   Man, 
Forever  fare  thee  well !  " 

He  turn'd  and  stepp'd 

Into  that  painted  world  of  leaves  and  boughs 
His  heart  and  hand  had  made ;  turn'd,  enter'd  in 
And  disappear'd  'mid  those  hush'd,  whispering  stemsc 
Then  did  that  whole  wood-world  his  soul  had  made 
Vanish  aloft  in  a  live  light,  all  hues 
Melted  and  intermingled  unto  White. 

But  one  saith  musingly :  "  What  god  is  he? 

No  god  !   The  god-like  had  still  wrought  and  staid ! " 


A  MEMORIAL 

HERE  in  the  chancel-stillness  let  us  sit 

And  dream  together  of  the  dead.    For  thou 

Lovedst  the  dead  with  fitly  equal  love. 

And  here  are  none  to  move  with  murmur'd  prayer ; 

Nor  mighty,  overpowering  music  pour'd 

To  bear  the  dream  adown :  but  quiet  now, 

Silence  and  splendor  of  the  shining  shrine. 

See  how  the  Christ  in  simplest  dignity, 
Tender  and  strong  and  gravely  radiant  sits 
With  hand  half-lifted,  teaching.   See  how  kneels 
Restful,  upheld  with  sweet  self-poise  of  faith, 
Buoy'd  about  as  by  fervor  of  full  proof, 
And  eyes  one  reverence  of  high  belief, 
Mary.    And  light  between,  above,  beyond 
And  wide  about  in  beams  of  rich  sunshine 
Through  the  grape-arbor  falling  fills  the  porch, 
Temple  and  colonnade,  fills  the  far  hills 
Purpled  and  all  yon  summer-shimmering  city 
With  steadfastness  of  saintly  aureole  stream 'd 

14 


A  MEMORIAL 

Through  and  through  :  atmosphere  of  peace  and  truth, 
Feel  how  the  pure  forms  fill  the  world  with  wonder 
More  than  a  summer's  sun.    Feel  how  the  day 
Floods  face  and  figure  of  them  mutely  there 
With  meaning  more  than  mere  memorial. 

Dream  on  the  peaceful  scene  of  serious  faith 
Steadfast  and  luminous  and  lovely,  flooding 
The  world  with  beauty  of  religion.   Dream 
Real  the  loved  presence  of  the  steadfast  dead 


SUFFERANCE 

AND  one,  tumultuous,  wail'd  through  bursting  tears: 
"  Lord,  is  this  she  ?  "   And  one  made  stifled  moan 
With  hot,  dry  agony  of  desperate  gaze. 
And  one  beside  the  bed,  impetuous,  dropp'd 
Floor-flung  with  sweat  and  passion-prayer  of  soul 
Rigidly,  terribly  beseeching ;  each, 
Each  heart  a  desolation  newly-made, 
Grief  lone,  full  to  the  fashion  of  each  strength. 

But  one,  and  he  the  eldest,  deepliest  bow'd 

By    his    world's    weight  —  half-broken    yet   though 

brave  — 

In  whose  heart  burden  of  the  loss  to  bear 
Were  anguish 'd  most ;  he  whom  his  gentlest  frame 
Seem'd  least  fit  to  sustain  in  grief's  first  fall ; 
He  but  stoop'd  low  and  kiss'd  her  where  she  lay 
Newly  dead  ;  mildly  laid  upon  her  lips 
Love's  benediction,  faith's  finality  :  — 
"Yea,  this  is  she.   There  can  come  no  grief  now, 
No  loss."   Then  he  stood  quiet  in  the  midst 
As  death  ;  fearing  not  life  nor  anything. 

16 


"MARIAE  NASCENTI" 

HOW  but  the  stone  aspires  !   See  huge  and  high, 
What  lift  to  the  great  groins ;  how  tiptoe  stand 
Pillar  and  pinnacle  and  minaret 
Intent  on  heaven-attaining  :  stalwart  still, 
Buttress'd  and  bearing  well  the  weight  of  a  world 
Which  broods  on  Milan  !   And  above  these  far, 
Ay,  beyond  Milan  as  an  ice-robed  Alp, 
Even  above  best  reach  of  saint  on  saint 
However  pedestalPd,  the  golden  maid, 
Of  God  the  Mother,  dominant  of  all  1 

It  is  a  work  of  ages  when  the  world 
Was  very  sure  of  aspiration ;  when 
Men  slaughter'd,  tortured,  buttressing  a  faith 
Which  tower'd  serene  beyond  mere  mundane  ways 
Of  firm  foundation  ;  when  the  power  of  earth, 
The  stony-heartedness  of  things,  seem'd  but 
The  more  assurance  of  a  love  vouchsafed 
Beyond  earth-intimation.   Then  the  stone  — 
Stone  still  and  needing  to  be  buttress'd  well, 

17 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Toil'd-in  for  centuries;  ay,  fretted,  chased 

With  ingenuity  of  much  disguise  — 

Leap'd  yet  a  wan,  white  flame  :  its  smoke,  the  clouds 

Even  of  God's  footstool ;  and  its  flower  and  birth 

The  Mother-Maiden,  pinnacled  of  all. 

Now  are  we  not  so  sure.    Our  warranty 

Absolves  not  slaughter.    Though  we  work ;  and  some 

Have  solace,  learning  of  a  faith  that  builds 

No  altars ;  nay,  nor  longer  needs  to  build. 

Our  faith  is  not  a  stone,  nor  our  new  Christ 

Born  of  an  idol  eminent  o'er  all. 

Yet  are  there  hours  when  we  would  fain  be  sure, 

Have  stones  that  we  might  buttress  ;  but  to  be 

Certain  of  aspiration ;  not  as  now 

Mute  for  the  fear  we  would  not  speak  aright. 

Yea,  is  this  temple  for  a  mummery  ? 

Are  stones,  that  leap  and  lift  with  yearning,  tombs 

Of  a  dead  passion  and  a  soul  that  was  ? 

Is  there  no  faith  which  Milan  may  today 

Feel  vaulted,  groin'd  and  pinnacled  ;  no  Love 

High  over  Milan  ?  — 

18 


"MARIAE  NASCENTI" 

In  this  vast,  dim  place 
A  woman  crouch'd  ;  ah,  with  an  usual  need 
Of  intercession ;  at  the  least,  a  want 
Of  heart-salvation  !  And  within  her  soul 
(Her  intimate  estimate  of  many  things 
Their  mutual  ministry  each  truth  to  each), 
Even  through  the  mockery  of  those  stone  lips 
Of  hers,  which  mean  not :  may  not  meaning  be 
Of  pillar,  groin  and  lifted  vault,  of  saint 
And  saint  on  pinnacle  all  buttress'd  well 
And  chased  with  labor  of  old  years  of  hope 
When  strength  abounded  —  hero,  sage  and  saint, 
Angels  and  then  the  stars  :  and,  in  the  midst, 
With  world-inviting  arms  compassionate 
The  Christ-Child  Mother :  Minister  of  all  ? 


KARNAK 

THIS,  then,  is  Karnak.    From  without  her  walls 
Come  sounds  of  man  and  beast ;  but  from  within, 
None.   If  beyond  her  gateways  there  be  green 
Groves  and  the  silver  of  wide  streams,  within 
Are  none.   But  stones  are  here  yet,  huge  and  stark 
And  silent  in  their  ruin;  only  stones. 

What  homely  noise  ascends  into  the  air 
From  earth  around :  the  croon  of  doves,  and  chant 
Of  sudden  cockrels  ;  all  the  dooryard  sounds 
Of  humble  husbandry  !    And  thence  the  cry 
Of  children,  naked  as  the  dust,  at  sport. 
Thence,  too,  the  lilt  and  strange,  wailing  refrain 
Of  boys  who  bear  in  baskets  the  dark  loam 
(And  they  can  dig  but  sphinxes  to  the  light!) 
Fresh  from  a  bank-side.   Or  above  these  all 
An  ass,  his  sufferance  failing,  speaks  at  last 
That  agony  of  utterance  of  his. 
Such  are  the  sounds ;  with  overhead  the  scream 
Of  vulture,  owl  or  hawk  who  find  delight, 

20 


KARNAK 

Refuge  and  home  in  ruin.  But  within 

Is  silence  like  eternity ;  and  stone.  — 

Ay,  and  about  this  mighty  death-mask  lies 

Yon  lustrous  circlet  of  the  youngest  green 

That  grows  by  gift  of  Nile.  And,  on  beyond 

The  circuit  of  where  once  was  Thebes,  uprear 

Cliffs  that  are  catacombs  of  kings;  whereby 

One  sees  a  temple  to  greet  Karnak  still 

Through  ruin ;  or,  mere  flecks  upon  the  plain, 

Memnon's  colossi  gazing  eastward  yet 

Though  sight  was  long  since  reft  them,  and  their  dawn 

Leaps  not  that  gave  them  voice.   And  these  are  not 

Thebes  nor  eternity,  but  tombs  and  stone 

Tottering  in  ruin.  Nothing  that  was  built 

Lives;  only  lives  the  young  spring  everywhere.  — 

Though  these  were  builded  for  eternity, 

These  stones  ;  to  sun's  praise  whilst  the  sun  be  lord! 

Thebes,  to  be  Thebes  an  if  the  heavens  fall !  — 

Lo  !  the  day  lingers.   These  vast  arches  stretch 
Purpling  their  shadows;  and  themselves  grow  gold. 
And  somewhat  of  the  sky  seems  strewn  among 


21 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Their  fallen.   And  the  sun-rays  stream  a  strength 

To  build  up  Karnak  :  and  the  place  is  whole. 

Yon  black-stoled  verger  seems  at  sacrifice 

With  incense  —  certainly  world's  parasites 

That  pester  are  not  here  :  but  only  I 

With  Pharaoh's  children  and  a  thousand  thoughts 

How  Egypt  still  were  Egypt  —  I  alone 

Weeping  in  Karnak!  For  we  now  who  build 

Have  knowledge  how  our  building,  though  of  stone, 

Earns  not  eternity.   And  we  are  come 

Since  Pharaoh's  hour  through  many  a  wanton  hope 

Of  other-worlds,  back  to  men's  earth  at  last, 

Faithless  of  any  other  earth  whereon 

To  build  us  temples ;  seeking  only  now 

To  build,  if  build  we  must,  not  out  of  stone 

Nor  to  eternity  —  unless  today 

Fore-hold  tomorrow ;  save  the  life  of  things 

Be  proven  in  dying;  and  our  conscience  of 

Ruin  be  resurrection.  — So  we  stand 

Weeping  in  Karnak  for  the  faith  of  kings. 


22 


THE  TOMBS  OF  THE  KINGS  AT  THEBES 

HERE  are  world's  portals  to  the  underworld.  — 
For  I  have  been  and  seen  and  am  come  back ; 
And,  being  returned,  must  speak  of  what  I  saw. 

The  entrances  are  downward ;  and  the  ways 
Darksome  :  but  still  the  scenes  set  by  the  way 
Are  like  to  those  of  earth  if  not  so  fair. 
Merely,  'tis  night;  the  sun,  an  orb  of  dusk. 
And  these  are  ghost-things  merely  and  not  men  : 
Though  looking  like  them,  yet  lacking  their  life. 
For  earth  is  pictured  merely,  not  unlike 
That  Theban  river-plain  beyond  the  hills 
Where  life  is  teeming :  only,  not  alive. 
And  at  the  core  this  strange-hewn  underworld 
Is  of  the  desert  rocks  above  it,  whence 
The  corpse  was  carried  to  abide  below 
Eternally  beneath  them.    Nought  is  here 
Unearthly  :  only,  earth  is  here  like  death. 
Even  the  perpetuity  is  just 
Earth's  desert  seeming-perpetuity 

23 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Where  change  were  slow,  none  less  than  elsewhere 

sure, 

And  time's  eternity  less  subtly  fill'd 
With  values  born  of  mutability 
In  conscienced  apperceptions  among  men. 

Therefore  am  I  come  back,  having  been  and  seen 
How  wholly  worthless  were  an  underworld.  — 
We,  who  have  learn'd  how  night  and  day  but  prove 
Sun's  single  course ;  how  spirits  still  are  men  ; 
And  conscience,  all-time ;  need  no  longer  dig 
World's  exit  downward.   But  have  been  and  seen 
And  are  return'd,  each  hour;  by  every  breath. 


24 


ABU  SIMBEL 

THERE  is  an  hill  hath  open'd  out  its  heart 
Unto  the  sun  of  each  advancing  spring 
Through  many  thousand  ages  of  delight 
With  wonder  and  with  sweetness  mightily  ; 
A  temple  and  an  habitation  of 
The  dignity  and  wonder  of  all  things. 

Kings  were  its  acolytes.   And  at  its  gates 
Colossi,  clothed  in  sweetness  as  in  strength, 
With  sacred  wonder  at  the  world  gave  guard  ; 
Declaring,  even  by  beauty  more  than  bulk, 
The  splendor  of  that  hill's  unaltering  faith 
From  everlasting.   And  the  infinite 
Succession  of  the  days  and  nights  ;  the  flush 
Of  dawn  upon  that  portal ;  and  the  rich, 
Mysterious  meaning  of  the  moon  ;  have  yielden 
Unto  those  giant  wardens  something  of 
A  wisdom  earn'd  of  large  experience 
Regarding  earth  :  of  ever-murmuring  Nile 
And  the  still  orbit  of  the  Nubian  hills. 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Stars  lent  their  lustre.   And  a  nightingale 

Hath  sung  (or  haply  he  may  so  have  sung 

As  now)  through  every  twilight.  —  That  those  forms 

Have  scarce  been  cognisant  how  from  their  midst 

One  form  hath  shattered  groundward  ;  have  not  seen 

How  their  sole  hill  alone,  of  all  those  hills 

Which  seem'd  so  human,  e'er  had  any  heart 

To  open  at  the  springtime  ;  nor  have  felt 

How  kings  have  ceased  to  kindle  in  that  fane 

Incense  of  splendor ;  how  the  sweetness  of 

Those  inner  chambers  hath  given  space  to  dust; 

And  only  beasts  inhabit.    Nor  have  known 

How  sand  like  snow  lies  drifted  round  that  hill 

Tawny  and  savage,  swart  and  desert  gray. 


26 


THE  SCULPTURES  OF  ABU  SIMBEL, 
WITHIN 

NOT  for  thy  victories,  nor  for  this  vast, 

Vainglorious  temple  in  entirety 

(Though  that  were  somewhat,  Ramses  !)  but  for  this 

Innermost  chamber,  that  last  sanctuary 

Wherein  abide  the  best  of  Egypt's  gods  ! 

What  though  thy  figure  undivine  must  sit 

Beside  great  Thebes',  beside  great  Memphis'  God 

And  Him  Who  lights  the  world  ?    We  leave  thee  this 

The  last  infirmity  of  kings ;  and  thank  thee 

Still  for  that  inner  chamber  in  the  rock. 

There,  all  were  holy,  Ramses ;  nay,  even  thou  ! 

There ;  where  the  bats  inhabit  and  the  owl 

Finds  not  enough  of  starlight ;  where  no  air 

From  any  wandering,  desert  puff  of  wind 

Disturbs  the  settling  of  the  sifted  dust ; 

There,  though  as  in  crumbling  bands  bitumen-swathed, 

Nigh  lasteth  a  religion,  elsewhere  nought ; 

A  power  and  a  passion  and  a  spirit  — 

27 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Ptah  and  Harmachis,  yea,  and  Amen-Ra  — 
Which  needed  but  some  self-divinity 
(Nay,  Ramses,  no  divinity  of  kings  !), 
Some  insight  of  our  soul-unendingness 
(Conclusiveness  by  all-time  sympathy, 
Scarce  as  by  an  endurance  which  is  not)  ; 
To  move  and  hold  the  world  unto  this  hour. 
Call  thee  a  man,  humble  and  fain  to  sit 
In  dust  and  darkness,  featureless  and  worn, 
Though,  even  by  virtue  of  appreciant  doubt, 
Faith-hearted  to  move  heaven  to  help  the  world ; 
Call  thee  a  Christ :  and  earth  were  saved  anew  ! 

Men  can  earn  conquests  over  desert  hordes 
Now  as  in  thy  time,  Ramses ;  men  might  boast 
Vainglorious,  forsooth,  almost  as  thou. 
Thy  gods,  thy  pettier  godship,  were  not  so 
Efficient  to  restore  the  world.  — And  yet 
Step  from  this  chamber,  Ramses  !   Our  estate 
Hath  need  of  men  like  thee,  at  worst,  with  faith 
In  worth  and  warrant ;  who,  at  worst,  accept 
(Wiselier  than  thou  and  humbly  thus  the  more  !) 

28 


THE  SCULPTURES  OF  ABU  SIMBEL,   WITHIN 

Responsibility  through  all  they  do. 

Thou  hadst  no  doubts  of  thine  efficiency 

To  build  a  holy  place  unto  all  time, 

God-like  to  stand  accountable  at  last !  — 

Though  is  earth  doubting  still  beyond  this  rock. 

And  lo  !  even  now  her  doubt  (that  sympathy, 

That  soul,  of  best  belief !)  is  visiting 

What  else  were  sepulchre  !   The  springing  sun 

Casts  one  clear  shaft  past  archway,  pillar,  hall ; 

And  penetrates  thy  tomb  and  turns  this  stone 

To  triumph.   Shall  the  momentary  beam 

Provoke  no  stirring  of  these  senseless  things 

That  thou  hast  wrought  thee  ?    Shalt  thou  let  the 

world 

Learn  thee  too  late,  learn  thee  but  to  bemoan 
The  inestimable  error  thou  hast  made  ? 
Shall  sun  disclose  his  children  wholly  dead  ; 
To  leave  thee  lost ;  for  lands  that  knew  thee  not  ?  — 
Wake,  Ramses  !   Let  there  be  one  man  of  faith  ! 


29 


KERRERI 

ABOVE,  a  pitiless  burning ;  and  below, 
The  burnt  earth ;  here  and  there  a  mockery, 
Some  dream  of  the  desert  that  the  blue  above 
Were  fallen  and  found  unscorching :  but  the  truth 
Is  bitter ;  and  the  stones  are  blistering.  — 
Yet  were  it  rather  that  earth's  sufferance 
Is  ended  and  her  agony  endured. 
Earth  is  not  sleeping  now  :  but  —  '  only  dead  '. 

Earth  had  a  grisly  dream,  a  gaunt  debauch 

Of  truculent  riot  in  the  name  of  God, 

A  furious  lechery  of  faith  ;  and  here 

Awoke  in  death-throes.   Tens  of  thousands  slain 

Witnessed  the  cataclysm.   And  the  sun 

Burnt  the  bones  bare  and  left  them  where  they  lie :  — 

All  in  the  name  of  God ;  the  false  report 

Of  one  who  cried  :  "  God  cometh  to  demand 

That  all  men  through  the  mouth  of  me,  His  mouth, 

Worship  with  one  voice  ;  through  the  hand  of  me 

Smite  with  one  sword."  — The  unity-of-God 

30 


KERRERI 

Were  not  an  unity  of  creed  ;  the  cult 
Of  faith,  not  formal.  The  monotony 
Was  death,  not  life.  And  earth  was  drench'd  in  blood. 

So  serve  we  somewhat  faith  by  bathing  earth 

In  blood,  by  lying  and  by  lechery, 

Through  each  the  darkness  of  his  loneliness' 

Bewilderment  begot  of  love  and  need. 

So,  by  the  failure  of  the  singleness 

Of  creed,  best  prove  we  truth's  totality 

As  we  are  each  and  several :  '  God ',  the  whole 

By  virtue  but  of  multiplicity 

In  heart-belief,  each  heart  unto  himself.  — 

Then  the  sun  comes  and  burns  the  bones  of  men 

Bare  where  they  lie  ;  and  earth  lies  ashenly 

Dead  ;  save  for  some  uncertain  dream  of  blue 

Fallen  here,  yon,  nay,  everywhere  about : 

As  though  the  sky  were  found  unblistering. 


"OH,  TO  WHOM?" 

THOU  woman,  beautiful  and  glad  and  kind 
As  love's  own  soul  !  Thou  wonderful  and  wise, 
Silently  smiling  for  such  sun,  such  shine 
Of  blue  sky,  green  sea  and  the  wide,  white  sand  ; 
Like  sunshine  smiling,  like  this  crystalline 
Beauty  and  wonder  of  the  clean,  warm  world; 
Thou,  sitting  silently  and  smiling  ;  thou, 
Perfect,  a  world  to  worship,  power  and  peace 
Call'd  woman,  and  divine  —  peace  in  thine  eyes, 
Peace  in  thy  pure  smile  and  thy  smooth,  wide  brow 
And  in  thy  form,  flesh  moulded  without  flaw  : 
Thou,  peace  !  —  And  I  may  sit  beside  thee  thus 
Worshipping  silently  (yet  smiling  too) 
Thee,  of  thy  world  ;  and  wonder  that  the  day 
Can  hold  divinity  so  worshipful, 
Even  this  deep-eyed,  crystalline,  soft  day 
Contain  within  its  world  more  worshipful 
A  world  than  clouds  or  sky  or  sands  or  ocean, 
Containing  thee.   I  so  may  sit  and  smile 
Silently.   And  if  silence  seem  to  me 

32 


"OH,   TO  WHOM?" 

Someway  not  all  our  hearts  were  made  for ;  when 

Some  hour  I  needs  must  yearn  to  speak,  pour  forth 

The  worship  that  is  in  me,  praise  aloud 

This  wonder  and  this  richness  of  all  things ; 

Make  known  the  marvel  that  thou  art :  made  known 

That,  hearing,  thou  mayest  grow  more  glad  for  worship 

Musical,  universal,  reverent 

Of  all  thou  art ;  if  sometimes  silence  seem 

Miscomprehension,  unlike  lucid  love  ; 

If  life  necessitate  a  speech  and  motion, 

O  thou  divine,  shalt  thou  not  hearken,  lift 

My  life  to  level  of  thy  truth  of  love  ?  — 

Nay :  for  thou  feelest  all,  feeling  full  love 

Speechless  for  perfect  commune.   Shall  I  need 

Rebuke,  refusal  of  mere  hearkening 

To  voice  of  mine  ?  Else,  learn  in  silence  here 

Divinely  so  to  smile  in  mute  content  ?  — 

Dear,  I  am  no  dead  god  to  feel  thy  beauty 
Of  earth  and  air  and  ocean  and  of  thee, 
Nor  passionately  burst  in  speech,  pour  praise 
Unto  this  firmament  of  sands  and  ocean, 

33 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Sun,  clouds  and  skies,  all  thee ;  speak  passionately 
World's  divine-human  love  and  longing  forth 
Large  as  I  may  !  — Lo  !  that  thou  wilt  not  hearken, 
Hearken,  is  grief  too  great.    I  am  a  man. 


34 


A  DIALOGUE 

"  LOOK,  love,  where  easternly  beyond  yon  isle 

Glows  the  gold  moon  ;  and  all  the  wave  between 

Is  saffron.   And  a  flush  of  westering  day 

Tints  opal  the  near  face  of  things  :  these  tops 

Of  forest  which  from  this  wild  eminence 

Slope  seaward  ;  oaks  and  many  a  towering  pine. 

And  these  are  voiceful  with  the  serious  speech 

Of  this  soft  west-wind  from  the  after-day, 

A  murmur  and  a  whispering  musicwise 

Like  wash  of  tone-tint  widely  through  the  night. 

These  are  the  sights  and  sounds.    Look,  love ;  and 

hear  — 

That  we  may  seriously  and  like  some  cloud 
Receive  into  our  hearts  this  solemn  light 
Of  aftermath  ;  and  in  our  still  night-souls 
Be  luminous,  brooding  o'er  land  and  sea.  — 
Fancy  the  fate  of  him  who  as  a  cloud 
Not  luminous  but  utterly  alone 
Misses  or  sun  or  day-responsive  moon  ; 
Floats  fed  but  by  the  stars  ;  love,  feel  for  him. 

35 


EARLIER  POEMS 

We  are  not  like  him.   We  are  like  yon  cloud 

Which,  fed  by  stars  at  will,  receives  none  less 

Into  its  heart  this  solemn  aftermath 

Of  sun  and  of  the  sun-responsive  moon ; 

Still  sweeping  seaward  with  the  soft  west-wind." 

"  We  are  not  like  him.  Would  we  were  more  like ; 

In  this  our  hour  of  solemn  marriage-rite 

Of  earth,  air,  ocean,  night  or  day,  more  like 

His  nobler  loneliness,  the  absolute  poise 

Of  him  star-speculant,  sublimely  sole. 

He  in  his  loneliness'  sublimity 

Is  star-stuff,  yea,  and  night  and  day ;  alone 

Earth,  ocean,  sun  and  moon  unto  himself  — 

As  were  not  we,  for  all  night's  serious  vow.  — 

Would  (almost !)  each  alone  were  self-sufficed  !  " 

"  Nay,  love  ;  but  were  not  our  sufficiency 

Still  his,  his  most,  more  self-sufficient,  but 

By  being,  beyond  his  insight,  through  and  through 

A  sweet  supremacy,  a  focusship, 

Worldhood  and  unioning  of  things  that  are 


A  DIALOGUE 

(Ay,  who,  but  such  as  we,  might  be  assured  ?) 
Beyond  his  ken  who  lonelily  alone 
Unions  but  less  of  world  ;  hath  comradeship 
With  stars,  maybe,  yet  only  by  some  vague, 
Unhuman  half-light  indistinctively 
Of  reference  in  soul  to  earth  or  ocean, 
Dayspring  or  day-responsive  moon  ?    Ah,  love, 
For  we  are  All-sublimity ;  are  one 
With  self-completion.   And  the  star-fed  soul 
Is  God  but  in  and  through  our  holier  heart.  — 
Look,  love,  where  easternly  yon  moon  responds 
The  sun-love;  and  all  earth  and  ocean,  air, 
Daylight  and  night-light  in  yon  cloud  between 
Are  bosom'd,  luminous  on  the  west-wind." 


37 


MELOSPIZA 

FULL  in  my  front,  straight  to  the  sun  he  sang 
His  song.   And  I  have  heard  ;  and  comprehend.  — 
There  is  no  wonder  in  the  world  like  this, 
The  supreme  art-achievement. — Love  he  sang. 
And  in  so  singing  synthesized  a  world  ; 
Symphonized  utterly  an  universe. 

Plainly.  —  An  inconspicuous,  small  bird 
Mottled  and  fluff' d  of  plumage,  here  and  there 
Streak'd  chestnut  on  an  undertint  of  gray. 
Calmly.  —  A  brisk  impertinence  tongue-tied 
By  dint  of  bustle,  of  an  agile,  deft, 
Impudent  robbery  of  sod-hid  seed. 
Softly.  —  A  rustling  in  the  brush,  beneath 
Old,  autumn,  dead  things  and  the  tangled  stems 
Of  storm-thresh'd  vineries.   When  suddenly 
A  flutter  and  leap ;  and  plump  upon  one  stretch 
Of  naked  twig  aloft  at  level  of 
My  moveless  eye,  and  breath-to-breath  with  mine 
Unwhispering  lips  ;  close,  so  that  sun  and  sky 

38 


MELOSPIZA 

Sphered  us  two  as  one  centre ;  in  the  splendor 
Of  spring-shine  and  the  quivering  atmosphere 
He  sang.   Three  flute-notes  and  a  warble,  a  trill 
Of  half  one  hurried  instant:  and  'twas  done. 

'T  was  done.    The  full  throat  and  the  vibrant  tongue, 

The  sky-directed,  open  gape  were  proved  — 

If  just  by  their  infinitesimal 

Focusship  fix'd  of  universal  sky, 

Of  sun  and  earth,  spring  and  the  singing  soul  — 

My  soul,  mine  intimate  vitality! 

Ay,  for  I  heard ;  and  comprehend  and  worship 

For  art-achievement  in  an  absolute  love. 


39 


II 

POEMS  OF  NATURE 


MID-MAY 

LIFE  is  too  young,  the  sap  and  song  of  it, 

For  quiet,  firm,  robust  philosophy, 

Mid-solstice  of  the  million-marvell'd  mind ; 

Too  young  for  ripe  solidity  mature 

Of  the  midsummer's  noon.   But  sap  with  song 

Leaps  to  the  making  of  maturity, 

Surges  and  swells  and  bursts  in  million-marvell'd 

Newness  of  swift  growth  tremulous  for  delight ; 

Half -wondering  for  the  evanescence  ;  strong 

Yet  tender,  delicate-leaved  ;  weak  miracle 

For  gossamer,  green,  soft  subtlety  of  strength. 

Spring  leaps  mature  in  many  a  marvell'd  meaning 

Of  mid-solstitial  symphony  to-be ; 

Spring  leaps  mature  ;  even  as  solidity 

Rich  of  midsummer's  noon  and  firm,  robust, 

Full  chord  of  green-grown  June's  self-questioning 

Interprets  still  but  spring,  but  sap  and  song 

And  poesy  young  of  May's  old  miracle. 

Life  is  too  young  to  feel  life's  age-completion 

Complete  in  world's  new  youth.   But  sap  with  song 

43 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Show  substance  of  June-felt  maturity.  — 
How  feel  philosophy  alive,  save  song 
Leap  to  be  sap  and  surge  and  bloom  of  it  ? 
How  sing,  save  strong  in  million-marvelPd  mind  ? 
Wherefore  be  song  philosophy's  fit  speech  ! 
Wherefore  let  spring  sing,  meaning  the  full  June  ! 

Ay,  all  the  year 's  in  each  least  blossoming ; 

All  the  world,  all  the  search  of  soul  that  seeks, 

In  every  flower  and  blade  and  budded  sheaf 

Of  the  young-grass'd  lowland  and  the  shimmering, 

Gossamer  woods ;  ah  !  all  the  power  of  proof 

In  the  weak,  tentative  unfolding ;  truth 

Through  the  frail  metaphor ;  fragility 

Year-universal  by  the  throb  of  it ! 

There  are  fluff'd  ferns  unfolding  their  soft  fringe 

Of  feathery  fronds  beneath  the  cool  May-wind 

Low-linger'd  over  the  marsh  ;  or,  'mid  dank  mosses 

Where  wind  nor  sun  save  fitfully  falls  in, 

Uncurling  palely  their  pearl-featured  front 

Spread  backward-broad  to  feast  and  fill  from  air 

Full  of  their  verdure  of  the  massier  June 


44 


MID-MAY 

Mature.   For  't  is  the  richness  of  the  brake 

To-be  that  makes  the  meaning  beautifullest 

Of  the  May-swamp.   And  unto  the  May-swamp 

New  notes,  like  delicate  dew  or  sun-shower  spray'd 

Liquid-cool  from  the  myriad-moted  beam 

Aslant,  fall  flowery  from  the  bough  where  birds 

Make  sound  of  the  sap-music  in  May-mind, 

Make  bubbling,  overbuoyant  blossoming 

(Well-ware  how  blossom-burst  and  lilt  of  tune 

Bring  the  blush'd  fruit;  unware  how  ripe-juiced  fruits, 

Seeded,  eternalize  but  vernalhood) 

For  steep'd  cells  and  the  fibrous  strength  to-be ; 

For  world's  truth,  universe  of  throat's  own  tune. — 

How  should  the  May-bloom  cease ;  how,  the  furr'd  fern 

Desiccate  to  a  stiff  senility, 

Spring-song  turn  fruitage  and  through  fruit  decay  ? 

How,  poesy  age  as  to  philosophy  ? 

For  the  very  seeding,  for  the  forward  pulse 

Of  fresh  sap,  fresh  song ;  for  the  vitalizing 

Through  all  the  veins  of  fresh,  succeeding  spring 

Of  a  new  meaning  !   Firm  philosophy, 

Fact-conscious  foliature  of  grown  June-time 

45 


EARLIER  POEMS 

(Yielding  to  mirth  and  marvel  of  May-mind 
Meaning  for  miracle)  needs  yet  miracle, 
Spring-heart,  spring-hope,  spring-innocence  anew 
Fresh  out  of  fountains  of  its  past-won  faith 
Year  after  year ;  that  so,  by  pulsing  back 
Through  fall  and  fall,  ever  the  new-won  faith 
Of  June  shall  live  not  sole  by  memory,  live 
In  heart's  upsurging  of  ensuant  spring 
Perpetually  ;  that  spring  to  spring  shall  be 
Ever  ascension,  integrated  growth, 
Fulfilment  loftier  of  less-prophecy, 
Live  reconciliation  through  dead  June. 
E'en  as  May-song,  made  meaning,  fruits  and  fades 
In  wisdom  of  the  million-marvell'd  mind  ; 
E'en  as  world's  poesy  grows  mature,  truth-stale 
Philosophy ;  so  truth  world-conscious  seeds 
Self-life  in  death  of  the  world  ;  so  to  spring  ever 
Poesy,  rich  innocence,  beauty  more  and  more ! 


SPIRIT 

CLOUDS  cool  and  luminous-moist  as  moonbeams  float 

Pale,  liquidly,  in  morning ;  and  cool  rain 

Falls  shadowy  here  and   there  down  through  the 

blue, 

Down  on  the  dew-cool'd,  morning  green  below 
Of  the  new  woods ;  that  in  the  rays  of  the  sun 
Earth,  clouds,  soft  rain,  dew-mists  and  verdure 

gleam 

A  freshness  and  an  inward  lucency  ; 
Sunshine  in  earth  as  earth  in  sunshine  shown. 
Out  of  the  cool-blown,  moon-like  clouds  the  rain 
Drops  on  the  luminous  land  ;  that  the  wet  land 
Sparkles  in  sun's  quick  beams,  each  bud  and  blade, 
Briar  and  bloom'd  tree-top  bejewelPd  bright ; 
Each  bud  by  focus  of  enorbing  drop 
Sphering  the  sunrise,  each  a  full  world-dawn ; 
Each  bud  and  blade  a  life,  a  full,  small  world, 
Cosmos  enorb'd  in  cosmos,  sphering  so 
Beauty  complete,  organic,  self-sustain 'd 
In  every  heart  through  inference  of  all. 

47 


EARLIER   POEMS 

'T  is  a  day-dawn  of  beauty  through  all  things. 
Lush  meadows,  emerald-sheen'd  in  morning,  slope 
Velvet  with  undulation  soft,  spread  wide 
To  slant  beams  of  the  sun ;  or,  in  the  gloom 
And  shadowing  of  the  eastward  forests,  purpled  : 
Each  blade  an  inference  organic  through 
Sunshine  and  rainbow'd  mist  —  wide  atmosphere 
And  the  still-dropping  rain  and  clouds  and  sky 
Contributors  to  beauty  of  each  blade  : 
Spiritual  so.    (And  shall  not  these  weak  sheaths 
Exude  new  moisture,  new-breathed  atmosphere, 
New  clouds  and  rain  again  that  grass  shall  grow  ?)  - 
Behold  the  borders  of  the  wood  :  low  stems 
Lean  toward  the  meadows  and  the  cloud-canopies 
Above  in  the  sun  ;  they  burst,  and  from  their  buds 
Spread  tissuey  the  translucent,  web-like  leaves 
Frail,  gloss'd  and  hovering  on  the  waft  of  the  air 
For  buoyancy  and  nurture.   These  by  need 
Of  the  foster-rain  and  of  the  stimulant  shine 
Are  whole  and  beautiful  and  spirit-real 
For  power  through  dependence,  organized 
Sustainment  through  such  instability ; 

48 


SPIRIT 

Mutual  want;  reciprocal,  sweet  need ; 

Drinking  in,  drawing  up,  amalgamating 

Moisture  and  pasturage  to  breathe  again 

An  atmosphere  out  into  the  young  noon ; 

By  metamorphosis  one  mutual  self. 

Nor  is  the  unioning  in  beauty,  self 

Organic  of  the  maybuds,  otherwise, 

Which  through  the  pine-sod  pierce ;  anemones 

Of  crimson'd  youth  and  age-blanch 'd  flower,  the  yellow 

Lily  calPd  adder's-tongue  that  to  the  rain 

Flutters  and  trips  with  leaf's  smooth,  mottled  wing. 

And  the  clean,  cup-like  blooms  of  shrubb'd  blueberries 

Or  wildly-delicate  columbine  none  less 

Drink  in  and  render  forth  through  the  wide  air 

Sweet  interchange  of  pasture  and  of  health. 

To  name  the  multitudinous  upspringings 

Organic  of  new,  morning  beauty  (life 

Of  the  whole  world  in  each  conglobing  whole, 

Each  cosmos  through  each  cosmos)  were  a  work 

Of  wonder  without  end.  —  Lo  !  the  tall  trees 

Are  blithe  of  blossoming,  are  amber,  golden, 

Purplish  and  crimson  ;  tremulous,  faint  pink 

49 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Against  the  high  clouds  shimmering ;  or,  within 
The  sun-deep,  sapphire,  cool  sky-spaces,  glowing 
In  marvel  indescribable  for  spirit 
Drinking  in,  breathing  out,  over  the  earth. 
Even  brown  loam  and  gray-faced  rock  in  the  sun 
Are  drinking,  rendering,  organic  by 
A  chemic  congruence  of  elements  : 
Whole  beyond  bound  in  cosmos,  everything  ! 

For  all  the  world  is  morning-whole  in  beauty 

Spiritual  for  new  breath  perpetually ; 

Infinite  for  inversely-infinite 

Organization  within  organism, 

Self-world-determination.    Lo!  for  sun 

Manifests  sun  by  atmosphere  and  earth  ; 

Earth,  self-seen  in  the  sunshine,  through  each  growth 

Knoweth  a  cloud-fluidity  in  all  : 

Conclusive  as  the  soul,  being  one  therewith. 


SOUL 

THERE  is  intensest  heat  thrill'd  through  all  earth 

Quivering,  reeking  with  sun-saturate, 

Upshimmering  redolence ;  scent  smoke-like  steaming 

From  all  leaf-pores  of  forest  and  of  field 

Up  through  the  tremulous,  fervent  atmosphere 

From  earth  as  for  wide  altar,  incensewise 

Spread  through  the  cloudless  heaven's  hot  vault  to 

veil 

The  presence  of  the  omnipotent,  to  hide 
Splendid  beneficence  would  burn  too  bright ; 
Though  to  the  veil'd  face  of  the  god  earth's  prayer 
Is  green  and  soft  and  glad  to  gaze  upon. 
Incense  earth  offers ;  for  the  power  of  the  sun 
Thrills  into  strength  a  thousand  thousand  things, 
Flared  fires  of  sap-life  lifting  everywhere  — 
Green  tongues  of  lambent,  gleam'd  fervidity  — 
Up  out  of  smouldering  rock  and  loam  and  mould 
With  odorous  fume  and  pungency  of  blaze  — 
Revivified.   For  everything  of  earth 
Lives  but  by  interchange  of  strength  for  strength 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Now  most,  through  springtime  for  such  strength  of  the 

sun; 

Now  most,  when  yet  an  incense  in  hot  haze 
Veils  the  strong  sun ;  now  most,  when  interchange 
Of  breath  for  breath,  of  blaze  for  blaze,  half -hides 
The  fountain  of  high  fire  :  yet  hides  not  him. 
For  earth's  affinity,  by  aureole 
Flared  up  to  sun's  affinity  (exchange 
Of  fire  for  fire,  of  immanent  return 
From  flame's  effulgence  for  effulgent  gift 
Immanent)  makes  of  sun,  earth,  atmosphere 
One  mutualism  ;  makes  of  odorous  woods, 
Reek'd  fields  and  furrow'd,  fumed  plough-land  fit  figure 
Of  facts'  infinity  by  interflux  — 
Nor  god  nor  creature,  prayer  nor  incense  teeming 
From  earth  to  earth's  omnipotent;  but  incense, 
Prayer,  praise  or  love  the  omnipotent,  whose  sphere 
Is  day,  spring's  mutual  interflux  of  flame. 


WHITSUNTIDE 

THROUGH  many  days  endured  a  drouth :  the  heavens 
Heartless,  serene,  smiled  sneeringly ;  no  soul 
Shone  in  the  shallow,  clear,  untroubled  sky 
Of  sympathy,  no  shade  of  sorrowing 
For  sun-scorch 'd  earth  ;  but  day  by  day  the  sun 
Flared  white-hot  on  the  wound  of  earth  to  blister, 
Cauterize  but  not  cure  the  searching  sore ; 
And  the  dry  moon  came  dewless  to  day's  thirst. 
And  ceaseless  prayer  with  fervid  sacrifice 
To  the  hard  heavens  from  earth  sent  incense  up, 
Meek  exhalations  from  the  bosom  of 
Ocean  and  fever'd  lake  and  languid  stream, 
Propitiation  by  burnt-offering  steam 'd 
Of  earth's  best  moisture  for  the  softening 
Of  dry  heaven's  hard  heart ;  even  the  parch'd  fields 
Exuding  a  crisp,  sere  self-sacrifice 
Each  of  its  best.   And  yet  the  drouth  endured. 
Not  by  the  plaint  and  painfulness  of  earth 
Seem'd  the  high,  hard,  dread  heaven's  heart  stirr'd.  — 

But  swift 


53 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Came  there  between  the  heaven  and  the  earth 

A  great,  moist  wind  from  the  cloud-regions  over 

The  south  sea  and  beyond  the  horizon-zone, 

Alive ;  a  great,  wing'd  spirit  outspread  between 

Dead  heaven,  dead  earth,  and  reconciling  both 

Into  one  heart  and  hope  ;  being  born  of  both, 

By  mutual  wonder-woof  half-witlessly 

Of  prayer  and    prayer's    acceptance.     Though   the 

heavens 

Seem'd  to  deny  and  knew  but  to  deny 
Earth's  prayer,  and  earth  but  helplessly  to  plead 
In  isolation  utmost  each  from  each ; 
Yet  was  the  heaven's  heart  open'd  though  he  knew 

not, 

Open'd  by  pity  whilst  he  yet  denied, 
Open'd  for  incense  and  burnt  sacrifice 
Mingled  beneath  the  heavens  over  the  earth ; 
That,  when  world's  great  wind  came  leaping,  alive, 
Up  from  the  regions  of  the  oceans,  far, 
From  the  cloud-chambers  of  the  envaulting  vast, 
Was  the  world  ripe  for  its  awakening  :  rain 
Pour'd  from  the  turbid,  piteous  skies  down  on 

54 


WHITSUNTIDE 

The  faint  earth  through  the  bosom  of  the  breathing 
Of  the  great,  moist,  live  wind.  —  And  there  is  laughter 
Now  of  near  sun  in  heaven  ;  now  upon  earth 
Green  things  drink  in  and  feed  upon  and  fill  with 
Power  and  perfection  of  wet  warmth  inflow'd  : 
New  life,  new  interchange;  dead  poles  call'd  heaven 
And  earth,  proved  tropic,  axial  from  the  first 
As  now  ;  in  gyre  of  rain's  quick  pantheism  — 
Their  spirit,  one  great,  moist  wind  infusing  all. 


55 


SPRING-MOON 

THERE  is  moon-motion  through  the  living  night, 
Moist  and  awake  with  all  sweet,  wandering  scents 
And  whisper  of  the  washings  of  the  wind. 

Here  is  some  shelter.   But  above  (beyond 

These  needle-muffling  pines,  this  siffling  sway 

Of  silvery,  slim  leaves  of  the  gleaming  oak 

And  tender-poised,  new,  delicate,  lithe  birch) 

Is  a  wild,  wing'd  sea-wind  fill'd  with  the  moon 

And  murmur  and  moisture  of  the  moon-soak'd  sea ; 

An  ocean-nurtured,  strong  wind,  salt  and  laden 

With  flowery,  fresh  breath  of  the  bursting  foam ; 

A  wide  wind  soaking-up  the  spume  of  ocean, 

Sucking-in,  drawing-down  and  sweeping-on 

Moon-moisture  over  the  dim,  silver'd  land. 

And  like  the  motion  and  slow  murmuring  of 

Moon-saturated  ocean  are  the  music 

Rhythmical  of  the  shadowy  woods ;  the  mist-wove 

Pulsings  poetic  of  the  gossamer  grass 

Dank  through  the  fields ;  to  metrical  sweep  of  the  wind 

56 


SPRING-MOON 

Nodding  (like  dance  and  dive  of  moonbeam-frosted, 

Drift-foam)  in  orbited  elasticity, 

Fleck'd  on  the  undulating  bend  and  lift 

Of  the  wash'd  field-floor  beneath  the  ocean-wind. 

For,  in  the  potence  of  the  fair,  fresh  moon 
And  of  the  moon's  moist  wind,  all  land  like  sea 
Is  tremulous,  surgent  as  with  whisperings  faint 
Of  moonbeams  blown  like  summer-wandering  dews 
Through  the  bland  air  and  over  earth  and  ocean — 
One  luminousness,  as  of  night  alive. 


57 


QUIET 

AN  odor  as  of  moonbeam-blossoms,  scent 

Of  the  sweet,  white  moon  through  the  moveless  leaves 

Falling  and  feasting  well  the  dreaming  world 

With  perfume,  with  the  dew-mild,  cool  delight 

Of  apple-bloom,  fogg'd  grass,  liquidity 

Of  purplish  lilacs,  sensuous  breathings  forth 

Amingle  with  the  moon  to  seem  its  soul, 

An  effluence  and  a  fluorescence  floated 

Mistily  languid  through  wan  atmosphere  — 

A  moth  with  fluff'd  whirr  of  his  soft,  furr'd  wings 

Wanders  awide  and  vaguely  ;  in  moonlight 

Visible  like  some  indolent  apple-blossom 

Lifting  and  falling  loose  through  the  still  air. 

It  is  a  picture  of  the  purest  peace, 
Yet  fill'd  with  pulsing  life.   Dew,  moon  and  flowers, 
Fogg'd  grass  and  perfume  and  the  languorous  moth 
Are  peaceful,  beautiful  but  by  their  breathing 
Of  light,  of  moisture,  sound  or  sweetness  forth  : 
Each  heart  and  life  a  focussing  for  life 

58 


QUIET 

Of  all  hearts  else ;  dew,  moon  and  flowers  and  moth 
In  almost-silence  yet  a  power,  a  peace 
Alive  —  as  peace  is  world-whole  passioning 
Equable ;  liquid  effluence  mutually. 


59 


FORCE 

A  STRONG  wind  as  of  winter  is  awild 

Through  the  warm,  summer  woods,  urgent,  compelling 

Green  boughs  to  utterance  of  music,  moving 

The  sun-world  with  emotion  to  a  song. 

Even  the  moist  underwood  is  scattering  too 

Dew-pearls  and  dew-toned,  liquid  notes  along 

The  flood  of  the  vigorous  air.    And  flower  and  fern, 

Brimm'd  of  sweet  incense  and  bewilder'd  over 

With  honey-wine,  spill  largess  of  their  marvel 

On  the  damp  floor  of  the  forest ;  that  the  wind 

Is  rhythmic  for  the  throb  of  metrical  drops 

Pulsating,  pattering,  and  for  swirl  of  boughs 

Blade-laden  with  a  pendulous  foliage.    Earth 

Is  one  rich  plash,  rich  wavering  of  plumes 

Through  the  green  wood- world.    And  tree-tops  above 

Are  chanting  like  a  sea,  with  gusty,  seething 

Sweep  of  the  pine-caps  and  the  tufted  surge 

Of  frothy  hemlocks,  with  the  burst  of  oak 

Rough  as  of  heavy  foam  on  rocks.   The  woods 

Above,  below  are  wroth  like  a  wild  sea 

60 


FORCE 

Green,  strenuous-voiced ;  with  flashings  of  a  spindrift 
Spray'd,  sun-spark'd  from  the  leaf-liltings  and  quick 

shafts 

Of  sunshine  darting  into  the  dim  depths. 
The  woods  are  all  one  ocean-voiced,  plumed  bird, 
One  feathery-foliaged  ocean  greenly  gleam'd. 
And  blown  birds  from  the  shoals  of  such  a  seething 
Wing  a  wide  way  out  over  this  green  ocean 
With  froth-like  whirl  beyond  the  hoary  burst 
Of  the  boughs,  birds  swept  and  windily  battling  with 
The  ponderous  air  and  with  the  driven  foam 
Below  or  driven  flecks  of  the  flurrying  cloud 
Swirl'd  through  the  blue  above.   And  the  sun's  light 
Flashes  from  their  gloss'd  wings  as  from  the  leaf-gust 
Of  the  flashing  forest  or  the  sea's  sun-soak'd  spray.  — 
For  ocean  under  the  gale  is  a  spume-forest 
Full-leaved  and  lusty-bough'd,  streaming  awide 
To  stress  of  the  sounding  wind  and  steep'd  in  light 
Deep  to  the  roots  of  the  quick-rifted  waves 
Gale-concaved.  And  the  sea's  bursting  boom  of  boughs 
Makes  music  of  motion  like  the  land's  own  voice.— 
That  blown  sea  and  blown  land  like  great,  glad  birds 

61 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Are  battling  in  their  beauty,  battling  with 

Their  spirit  of  the  blue  sky,  whose  life  and  motion 

Makes  of  all  things  a  musiounioning ; 

With  the  free  spirit  of  yon  swift-off-sweeping  storm 

Whose  wintry-molten  breadth  beneath  the  sun 

Flows  down  the  east,  withdrawing  gloriously 

As  from  a  world  for  a  world's  work  done  —  abiding 

Still  in  the  world  by  world's  work  done ;  by  waking 

Morning  to  poetry ;  earth,  sea  or  sky 

To  bird-like  animation  metrical ; 

To  beauty  of  blithe  unrest  and  sunshine  wild. 


62 


MIDSUMMER 

IT  is  the  unreap'd  season  when  the  fields 

Are  flood-tide  high,  are  flush  and  mildly  misted 

Over  with  moonlight-film  of  silver  seed 

In  the  glumed  beard  and  pollen-laden  sheaf. 

There  is  no  glared,  keen,  crude  intensity 

Of  heat's  excessive  zeal ;  but  mellowness 

Serene  in  a  replete  maturity ; 

No  lavish-loose  voluptuousness,  no  riot 

Wanton  nor  waste  of  the  world's  strenuous  strength  ; 

But  bland  mobility  of  throbb'd  repose, 

Firm  pulse  of  power  self- whole  and  self-possess'd. 

It  is  the  long-grass'd  season.  Multitude 
Of  sun-suffused,  soft,  moonlight-misted  life 
Dwells  in  the  fields  :  the  purple-globed,  cool  clover 
Fluid  to  flux  of  the  breeze ;  and  fluorescent, 
Wing'd  irises,  blue-bird-like,  lucent-vein'd 
Liquidly  fluttering  —  brooding  through  the  noon  — 
To  surface-swell  and  ripple  of  wind- wash 'd  green. 
And  red  wood-lilies  preen  and  peer  upon 

63 


EARLIER   POEMS 

These  people  of  the  deep  from  the  safe  shore 

Firm-footed  ;  while  along  the  grass-lapp'd  land 

Freshly  luxuriate  in  the  solstice'  surge 

Meshes  of  undulating  vine,  convolved 

With  roses,  lapsing  gleams  of  the  June  foam  : 

All  rich,  reposeful  in  mobility, 

Mildly  mature  as  a  midsummer's  moon. 

And  moonbeam-blossoms  umbellate  of  elder 

Canopy  the  dim  deepness  of  the  grass 

To  twilight  coves,  whose  echoey,  lisping  murmurs 

Whisper  the  stirring  of  the  heart  of  the  weed  ; 

Where  the  dwarf'd  cornel  and  stout  pulpit-plant 

Take  root  and  cling  within  the  wash  of  the  tide. 

Here  are  the  many-finger'd,  legg'd  and  finn'd 

Creatures  of  shallow  seas  whom  the  rank  flood 

Cramps  in  their  cavern-quarters  :  dusk-eyed  moths 

Dreaming  away  world's  plenitude  of  light ; 

Sheath'd  beetles  busiest  foraging ;  blue  wasps 

Drifting  and  darting,  shivering  the  vague  fern  ; 

And  warm  bees  walking  in  the  bottom-weed 

For  chillness  and  relief  to  laden  wing. 

And  suddenly  some  lithe  leviathan, 


MIDSUMMER 

Scale-coiPd  in  forest-fastness  of  dun  earth, 
Starts,  slides  and  sweeps  off  into  the  unreap'd 
Beyond,  beneath  sun's  sooth  deliciousness ; 
Leviathan,  startling  the  sloth  of  the  wave, 
Churning  to  spume,  glint-bubbled  blanch  of  spray, 
The  swiftness  of  his  thridded  path  and  leaving 
Flexures  subsiding  wide  along  the  shore 
And  voice  of  heart  of  the  grass  in  hollow  cave. 
Spiders  spin  too  from  crest  to  crest  of  the  green, 
Wind-wavering  ocean  net-like,  filmiest  traps 
To  stay  wing'd  things  to  prey  upon  ;  but  beams 
Of  the  hazed,  opal  noon  show  these  one  sheen 
Pale,  iridescent  as  of  sea's  concaves 
At  midnight  ere  the  moon  is  at  the  wane. 

It  is  the  flood-tide  season.   The  flush'd  fields 
Follow  the  fulness  of  the  sun  ;  as  ocean 
Floods  to  the  following  of  a  summer's  moon. 
And  the  mild  moon  mature,  when  sun  descends, 
Glows  mellowly  up  out  of  the  dun  east 
Over  the  moonlight-film'd  and  silvery-seeded, 
Glumed  beard  and  pollen-bristling  sheaf  of  the  grass ; 

65 


EARLIER   POEMS 

The  cool,  wide  moon ;  a  silvery,  gentle  spirit 
Bland,  liquid-firm  as  solstice-flowering  fields 
Or  moon's  own  ocean's  luminous,  molten  flood ; 
A  power ;  a  multitudinous  repose 
Of  beams  in  rich,  replete  mobility. 


66 


MORTMAIN 

MOUNTAINS,  and  fog  enveloping  :  the  hills 

Invisible,  save  near  and  yon  an  height 

Bald,  desolate,  primeval  peering  up 

To  level  of  this  desert  pinnacle, 

Swathed  about  by  impenetrable  mists 

Of  ocean  ;  an  impervious,  vague  drift 

Up  from  the  unseen  ocean-welteringness  — 

World  nullified,  made  emptiness  anew.  — 

World  was  not  alway  so.   One  hour  agone 

Glow'd  the  clear  concave  high  of  sparkling,  clean 

And  vivid  sunshine  ;  far  beneath,  the  sea 

In  blue-bright,  silver  panoply  outspread 

With  glittering  isles  and  shimmering  sails  athwart 

These  mountain-bases ;  and  these  forest-hills 

Radiant  of  verdure  in  all  marvel-shapes 

Of  summer  splendidness  beneath  the  sun 

Steam 'd  odorous,  alive  with  bloom  and  bird.  — 

Nor  in  this  solitude  of  stagnant  fog 

Is  world  below  quite  breathless  ;  for  a  fume 

Of  pleasant,  spruce-wild,  honey-tingling  scent 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Steals  upward  mingling  with  the  moisted  salt ; 

And  the  voice  of  a  bird,  the  tinkling,  bell-toned  tongue 

Of  the  thrush,  upbubbling  from  the  dead  of  the  deep, 

Mounting  and  thrilling-through  the  void  of  the  sky 

Till  the  vast  and  vault  are  heart  and  breast  of  him ; 

Till  all  the  misty  nothingness,  denuded, 

Nebulous,  old  obscurity  seems  full 

To  overflowing  of  the  swelling  hills 

Still  verdure-vivid,  of  the  radiant  sea 

And  sparkle  of  the  blue  and  breath  of  the  green. 

World-vacancy,  how  world-impossible ! 
Ever  some  pinnacle,  some  isle  above 
Fog-oceans,  sole-surveyor  of  the  deep, 
For  whom  indeed  the  dark  shows  visible  !  — 
Hark  !   and  the  bird-song !   Soft !   The  breath  of  the 
pine ! 


68 


NOON 

ENDLESS  an  hoary-hearted,  gray-grown  sea 

Bursts  on  the  gaunt,  gray  sands  :  an  aged  shore 

Strengthless  and  sapless  in  a  withering  glare, 

Stiff-baked  and  parch 'd  save  for  the  beating,  salt, 

Sere  surge  of  ocean.   And  a  ghostly  presence 

Of  gray-grown  mists  from  grizzled  sands  and  gaunt, 

Foam'd  ocean  fumes  and  stealthily  out  over 

The  young,  green  land  through  earth's  sunshine  is 

spread  — 

A  shroud  and  sepulchre  morn-saturate, 
Sepulchring,  saturating  world's  sunshine. 

Gray  vapors  so  from  borders  of  old  ocean 
Brood  above  land's  young,  green  futurity 
Where  crops  are  ripening,  broad  with  gossamer  breath 
Through  filmy  oat-fields  whose  fresh-seeded  husks 
Hang  pale  in  tassell'd  tremulousness.   The  mists 
Make  summer-sea-like  the  tall,  pendulous  oats. 
And  undulations  of  soft  breath  of  the  beach 
Pass,  wave-pulsations,  over  the  blown  breadth 

69 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Of  bristling  barley ;  and  of  mellowing  rye 

Trouble  its  tawny-hued  fecundities 

As  with  heart-beatings  of  primordial  floods 

Inheritant.   And  over  the  long  grasses 

The  beach-breath  floats  in  foggy  fleeces,  shrouds 

Their  shoal,  warm  surging  to  confound  the  fields 

With  sea's  horizon  and  the  sphering  sky. 

And  along  oozy  watercourses,  where 

The  slack  tide-inlet  in  the  marsh  absolves 

Its  brackish  blue,  the  white  fog  lingers,  steep'd 

In  moist,  hot  sunshine  and  the  glooming  green, 

Making  of  marsh  and  fluid  ooze  an  union, 

Sea  both  and  shore :  as  newness  of  the  world 

By  perpetuity  is  endless  eld  ; 

Young,  green  land  but  as  old,  hoar-hearted  sea : 

Land,  all,  or  ocean ;  sepulchred  in  mists 

Unioning,  saturating  world's  sunshine. 


70 


MARSH-MUSIC 

A  SONG  of  lands  low-lying  :  moist  July 

Ripe  in  repletion  of  green  wilderness 

Grown  rank  and  flowery  fine  !  The  delicate  iris 

Yields  place  to  bright-spiked  pickerel-weed.   Wide  lilies 

Spread  open-bosom'd  to  the  quickening  sun 

Abroad  upon  the  blue-gleam'd,  molten  pool. 

And  flat,  glazed  pads  bear  burden  of  fat  frogs. 

Fish  leap.   And  many  a  purple,  gauzy-vein'd, 

Swift-hovering,  darting  dragon-fly  makes  flurry 

And  film-like  blur  to  brush  the  polish'd  bog; 

Evaporating  (to  a  cobweb)  imaged, 

Sheen'd  sky  and  bladed  banks  —  where  on  the  banks 

Tall  eupatorium  twilight-pink,  flat-cluster'd 

Lifts  dark  its  leafy  stems.   And  sweet  spiraea 

Weighs  warm  the  luscious  air  with  white,  wan,  weedy 

Odor  of  honey  loved  by  butterflies. 

And  song  in  succulent  sunniness  issues  out 

From  breath  of  the  marsh  in  bubbling  music.    Birds', 

Bees',  all  quaint  manner  of  insects'  notes,  cicadas' 

And  shrill  mud-crickets' ;  song  spills  everywhere 


EARLIER   POEMS 

All  over  the  land  low-lying  ripe  in  the  sun  ; 
Song,  fine  for  purple  and  golden  growth,  for  glory 
Of  moisture  and  green,  flowery  wilderness.  — 
How  make  more  joyous  song  than  warm  July  ? 


72 


A  CEREMONIAL  VERSE 

HERE  is  wild  altar.   And  an  incense  wreath'd 

Of  music  melts  along  the  envaulted,  dim, 

Groin 'd  dome  above  of  canopied  rib-boughs 

Shadowy :  music  of  a  myriad  mild, 

Croon'd  wood-notes  echoing  cool  through  hollow  dusk 

Of  twilight  leafage.    Here  are  censer'd  voices 

Chanting  their  canon-strict,  in  consequence 

Symphonic,  cloistral  through  the  sacred  shade  : 

Tone-dedication  to  night's  festival. 

And  ritual  service,  for  the  sacrifice 

Of  soul  to  soul  in  self-devotion,  sings 

The  bridal  in  the  ceremonial  scent 

Of  pines'  aroma  :  monotone-response 

Low,  broad,  impassion'd  as  of  priest.    Nor  hush 

Of  wing'd  assemblage  through  the  serious  aisles 

Is  wanting  for  world's  warrant ;  to  the  vow 

Witness  sufficient  of  the  woods,  with  some 

Swift  stir  as  of  an  eye  to  start  and  see.— 

Bring  to  the  bridal  savor  of  sweet  turf, 

Sanctity  of  soft  moss,  enveiling  fern, 

73 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Shrine  of  inwoven  ivy ;  consecrate 
Cool-chaliced  nectar  to  the  forest-font ; 
Bless  these  to  furnish  bridal.   Be  the  breeze 
Murmurous  not  alone  with  wandering  moth 
Nor  muffled  quite  in  dew ;  that  pendent  boughs 
Above,  beneath  night-skies  shall  shake  and  show 
Luminous  wonder  and  far  worship,  stars 
Of  still  fire  flaring  and  some  meteor-gleam, 
Flash'd  for  life's  secret  of  the  mystery, 
Light's  self-consuming  ardor  unconsumed. 
Bring  these  to  blessing  :  for  the  bridal's  breath 
Gives  consecration;  and  earth's  soul  were  whole. 

Here  is  wild  altar ;  and  the  nuptial  earth 

Stands  wedded  ;  for  the  wide  world's  want 's  assuaged, 

It  is  close-woven  night.   Rapt  atmosphere 

Feels  exhalation  of  atomic  heart 

In  heart,  warm  vapor  within  vapor,  dew 

Globule  to  globule  coalesced  to  seep 

Absolved  of  turf-pore  through  the  spongy  mould : 

Moisture  in  metamorphosis ;  earth,  air, 

The  holier  by  precipitance  and  death  : 

74 


A   CEREMONIAL  VERSE 

Perpetuation  but  by  passage,  pulse 

Out  of  old  longings  nebulous  to  new 

Marriage,  completion  in  life's  change  and  loss. 

So  through  the  solemn  forest :  cell  with  cell 

Of  veinous  tissue,  as  with  bridal's  breath, 

Breaks  to  the  impregnation,  meek  conceives 

Sap  to  the  framing  of  ingenerate 

New  cell  —  leaf's  reconciliation,  life 

By  procreant  passing.    And  night's  cloistral  sound 

Vibrant,  symphonic  is  but  wedded  voice 

Of  chord-rasp'd  chord,  transmuting  throb  of  power 

To  power's  metempsychosis,  act's  relapse 

Dyingly  distant,  ever-widening  sphere 

Of  married  molecules,  an  unioning 

Existent  but  by  ceasing,  on  and  on. 

What  of  the  ritual  of  the  flowers  ?  Shall  moth, 

Nestling  to  nectar'd  lurement,  bear  on  breast 

Fertility  for  sacrifice  of  sweet, 

Germinant  potence  of  the  seed  to-be 

For  rapine  of  heart's  nurture  ;  and  world's  heart 

Not  recognise  seed's  reconciling,  right 

Exchange  of  death-through-life  for  life-through-death  ; 

75 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Not  realize  world-assurance  for  world-fear, 

Selfhood  for  isolation,  consciousness 

Of  love's  divinity  for  love's  dismay  ?  — 

Bless  to  the  bridal  nought  of  earth  !  Earth's  soul 

Is  wide-initiate  in  perpetual  pulse 

Of  union'd  passing,  self-pre-bless'd.  World  knows 

Meaning  of  spirit's  mystery  and  might, 

Love's  soul-virginity  of  sacrifice, 

Self-realization  by  devotion.   All 

Is  wild-wood  altar.   And  the  priestly  earth 

Stands  wedded.    And  the  bridal  earth  breathes  whole, 


CONSECRATION 

THE  year  fills  to  the  fall.   A  frosty  feel 

Clarifies  air,  precipitates  all  fume, 

Fever  and  frothing  of  earth's  flood-tide  time 

Down  out  of  opal  atmosphere ;  that  flowers 

And  fields,  brown-gold  and  mauve  and  neutral  hues, 

Yet  gleam  gem-like  and  clean  for  crystalline 

Purification  of  the  perfect  world. 

It  is  earth's  custom  so  to  consecrate 

Life  as  by  life's  completion  unto  death ; 

Bring  forth,  bear  beauty  in  fecundity ; 

Just  for  the  absolute  lustration,  rich, 

Perfect,  the  ultimate  passing.   At  this  hour 

Of  the  first  cold,  crisp  frostiness  and  fear 

For  final  dissolution,  dwells  all  earth 

Never  more  open,  placid-proud  and  pure, 

Firm  in  self-dedication  :  sanctity 

Virgin,  of  summer  laid  in  fall's  dead  bed, 

Love's  realization  in  life-sacrifice. 

The  year  flowers  to  the  fall.   Earth's  consecration 
77 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Is  intimate  achievement ;  perfectness 

Earth's  preparation  for  the  backward  thrust. 

Nowhere  is  any  interstice  ;  but  life 

Teems  and  is  multitudinous.   Earth's  passing 

Shows  fruitage,  ripening,  an  actualizing 

Of  spring's  potential  bud  and  blush  ;  of  summer 

Love's  realization  in  life-sacrifice.  — 

Autumn's  are  these  grain'd  grasses  ;  autumn's  too 

The  feathery  asters  and  sweet-breathing  herbs ; 

Wild-helianthus,  jewel-weed,  the  wand 

Of  sunny  succory ;  and  the  garden-glow 

Of  melon-blossoms,  hollyhock,  bright  stock, 

Gay  marigold.     And  autumn's  lingering  birds 

Call  and  are  quoted  by  the  echoey  sky 

In  quavering,  clear  contentment.    Fall's  cool  clouds 

Are  vivid,  plume-like  white,  wing-like  of  motion 

Through  the  high,  sapphire  firmament.   And  stars 

By  night  are  cold-distinct  and  tingling-crisp 

As  not  in  the  vague  dusks  of  earlier  year. 

For  't  is  earth's  absolute  perfection,  freedom 

Of  world-rich,  wonderful,  wide  fruitfulness ; 

Flower,  field  and  leaf,  wing'd  insect,  worm  or  heaven 

78 


CONSECRATION 

Each  at  top-teeming  of  fecundity 

And  all-appreciation  functional ; 

Life  at  the  crown-completion  :  even  swoon 'd  autumn 

Summer's  strong  wholeness  and  maternity  — 

Function-in-fulness  of  the  organic  year. 

The  year  yearns  to  the  fall.  —  Even  as  a  bride 
Bowers  in  a  beauty  of  lost  virginity, 
Joy  for  love's  power  of  sacrifice  :  so  earth 
Feels  death  life's  life ;  and  floods  and  fills  with  it. 


79 


RESIGNATION 

THE  sun  goes  down  on  autumn's  eldest  day; 

And  stars  come  ;  and  the  immanence  of  night 

Droops  over  earth  :  and  it  is  time  to  dream. 

Time  is  it  now  to  dream  and  perfect  place 

Where  vastness  only  and  enormous  night 

Include  and  ordinate,  so  sanctify 

Vague  gloom  to  solemn  majesty ;  when  motion 

Stands  even  as  if  transmuted  into  thought ; 

And  only  hush'd  and  high-starr'd  thought  may  take 

Breath  of  the  serious  breeze  ;  when  night  with  autumn 

Broods  and  revivifies  the  various  year. 

Nothing  in  bitterness  !  —  Woods,  nigh-denuded, 
In  those  slant,  pale  beams  of  the  morning  sun 
Have  sparkled  blithe  with  brittlest  rime  of  frost 
As  though  'twere  springtide  and  the  dew-dawn.  Oaks 
Have  flared  a  still-insistent  flame ;  thin  beech 
Glow'd  coppery  as  the  bronze-smoked  sky,  more  warm 
Than  bloom  of  mellowing  rye-field  when  the  year 
Was  newly  motherhood.  And  sinuously 

80 


RESIGNATION 

The  fold-on-fold  of  vine,  in  cataract 
Froth -figured,  wave-like  curl  to  rays  of  the  sun, 
Saffron  and  amethystine,  wonder-flush'd 
With  glad  glimpse  of  the  orange-scarleted, 
Bold  berries  in  between.  —  Are  such  the  shades 
Of  death-dismay  for  passing  of  the  year  ? 
And  day's  own  dying  !   Shall  the  gorgeous  glow 
Of  the  blood-flamed  cloud-region  and  the  arch'd, 
Empyreal  atmosphere  and  lambent,  rose 
Heart-throbbing  of  the  arteries  of  earth 
Seem  absolute  despair  unspeakable, 
Irreparable  for  life's  latest  loss  ? 

Nor  year  nor  sun's  at  loss  ;  for  these  (by  death 
Of  their  heart's  daytide  and  the  flower  of  earth) 
In  feeling  loss  their  law,  transcend,  absolve 
And  render  over  unto  light  and  lust 
Of  spring's  renewal  and  the  dawn-to-be 
Life's  inmost  moment  of  the  dearth  in  them.  — 
Still  is  it  spring  by  autumn's  dreaming  ;  still 
Remember'd  day  made  manifest  in  night. 


81 


THE  BARBARIANS 

THE  swart,  strong  mass  of  mountains  couch 'd  at  eve 

For  sleep  profound  and  peace :  their  forest-flanks 

Velvet  with  long  glance  of  an  autumn  sun 

Gold  to  the  day-down  ;  and  the  twilight-shades 

At  mute,  enveloping  ascent ;  and  air 

Lucent  with  purplish  exhalation,  sweat 

Of  steam,  moist  breath  from  day's  work  done :  rough 

hills 

Calm,  mild,  gigantic,  utterly  at  ease  ! 
And  a  mist-purpled  pool  with  swart,  smooth  breast 
Mirrors  those  mountains  in  their  mass ;  a  lair 
Of  cool  sweet-water  to  the  thirst-lolPd  tongue 
And  sogg'd  hoof  of  the  rough,  gigantic  hills. 
Swiftly  the  shades  ascend  ;  the  tawny-hued, 
Autumnal  foliage  of  the  mountain-flank 
Mellows  to  kindled  amber ;  burns ;  is  borne 
Down  out  of  day  like  ash  with  weight  of  night. 
Till  to  day-gone  a  ghost  comes  ;  opaline 
Fluorescence,  quickening  of  the  gradual  moon ; 
A  cold  gleam  from  beyond  the  eastern  ridge 

82 


THE   BARBARIANS 

Phosphoric-thrill'd  as  frost  flared  filmily 

Forth   through   the   dusk :    and    day,    asleep,    hath 

dreams.  — 

Lo !  it  is  night  upon  the  mountains,  night 
White  on  the  mists  of  mountain  and  of  mere ; 
Night,  with  dominion  of  the  enormous  moon. 
Lo !  the  swart,  rough-hooved  hills  sigh  deep  and  dream. 

Some  owl  hoots  through  the  hollow  night ;  the  boughs 
Of  crisp,  frost-crusted  hemlock  from  the  concave 
Of  black  moon-shade  reecho  hollowly 
The  hoot;  and  chill  cliffs  all  make  cavern  sound. 
Hark  !  a  loon  laughs  and  laughs ;  the  peaks  again 
Have  dream,  and  mock  as  cold,  harsh  hills  alone 
Laugh,  wan  with  mists  and  moonlight ;  and  the  frost 
Creaks  in  the  keen  fir-branches.   A  slow  bird 
Heavily  beating  the  mist-beams,  with  croak'd, 
Uncouth  cry  from  the  uttermost  frontier 
Wings  loudening  way ;  that  gutturally  loud 
And  more  loud  groan  the  gaunt,  crouch 'd  cliffs  in 

dream. 
Some  scared  jay  screams ;  from  vacant,  drear  oak-trunk 

83 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Woodpeckers  wail :  the  hoar  hills  scream  and  wail. 
Some  deer  stamps  on  the  dull  sod  ;  the  hard  thud 
Strikes  flint,  and  shrieks ;  and  at  the  sudden  speech 
Of  rock-tongued  headlands  the  buck  bounds,  betray'd, 
Startled  and  snorting  from  the  thicket,  breasts 
With  sparkling,  seethy  plunge  and  crackling  crunch 
Through  thin  shore-ice,  shattering  the  lake's  glazed 

moon, 

Thrashing  to  myriad  tinkling  discs  and  shrill, 
Metallic  phosphor  the  black  deep.   The  steep 
And  flinty-horn'd,  chill  mountains  clank  like  steel. 
Till  on  the  night,  heartening  the  old,  cold  moon 
To  burden  of  yearning  and  her  pulseless  mists 
To  motional  effulgence,  wakes  a  moan  — 
A  mourning,  mooting,  lorn  cacophony  — 
Monotonous  from  out  the  moss'd  morass  : 
Night's  longing  both  and  loneliness  intense 
Throbb'd  in  the  call.  And  those  hoarse,  shaggy  mounts 
Make  moan;  mourn'd,  contrapuntal  calling;  share 
Meaning  and  music  with  the  self-sick  need 
Of  moose  in  her  mate-mooding.   Yea,  jar  and  shake 

they, 

84 


THE  BARBARIANS 

Obsequent,  with  a  trampling,  clash  of  horns 
On  bough,  swift  thrust  and  firm,  persistent  hoof 
Of  him,  hills'  monarch,  who  with  strenuous  tread 
Starts,  strains  and  staggers  through  thick,  ripping  stems 
'Mid  gorge-gloom 'd  fogs,  obscure,  moon-sepulchred, 
Dread-rotting  forests  and  the  rock-brow'd  peaks : 
Moose,  frost's  hot  despot  and  most  monstrous  dream 
Of  those  ferocious  mountains.   He  shall  pass 
Tireless  pursuing.   He  shall  burn  a  blood 
That  wars  and  hurtles  as  the  torrent-rush 
Of  thousand  rock-streams.  Through  impetuous  night 
The  nightlong  shall  he  pass  nor  pause  nor  swerve ; 
Pass  and  keep  passing.  And  the  peace  of  him 
Shall  be  by  passion's  perpetuity.  — 
Moose :  through  the  forest  an  on-rushing  rage, 
Even  from  beyond  north's  broad  ridge-back,  beyond 
Foreland  and  moorland  and  quick,  tortuous  flood 
He  comes  and  comes  resistless  through  swart  night ; 
Lust's  monstrous,  mightiest  vision  of  hills  all. 

Such  are  the  savage  visions  of  rough  hills ; 
Night's  wrath,  and  wonder  of  primeval  world's 

85 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Grim-hew'd,  gigantic,  sinewy  unease  !  — 

Day  breaks  !    Black  brooksides  and  the  furry  flanks 

Glisten  for  gorgeous  frostlight.   Sleep-lock'd  horns 

Of  the  flinty  ridge  rouse  up  and  sweep  aside 

The  shrunk  moon  from  the  western  vault.    Hill-shapes 

Rear,  rise  and  shake  night's  icy,  moon-born  mists 

From  heavy  shoulders'  rough  barbarity. 

Soughs  a  breath-blare  of  breeze ;  a  quaffing  draught 

Sluices  the  lake,  'mid-stirr'd,  to  steely  trough, 

Crest-blaze.    (A  sun-warn'd  flock  of  floating  fowl 

Wing  flight  with  whirr  and  whiffling.)  —  And  men's 

curse 

Snarls  on  the  mountains;  and  men's  iron  hand 
Reeks  with  earth's  sap  of  sacrifice.  — Wroth  world 
Starts  forth  to  fight ;  to  prey  upon  and  feed  from 
Itself 's  own  maw  exhaustless ;  strong,  swart  world ; 
Scarr'd,  gaunt,  gigantic,  cursed  in  hoof's  unease ; 
Tremendous,  terrible,  primeval ;  passing 
Resistless,  grand,  self-passion 'd,  calm ;  ay,  pulsing 
Peace-fill'd  by  blood's  ubiquity  of  wrath  ! 


86 


HIEMATION 

IT  is  the  first  snow.   And  the  scars  of  earth 
Are  cover 'd.   And  oblivion  descends 
Over  old  agony.   And  every  ill 
Lies  heal'd.    And  winter 's  well.  — 

Snows,  marbled  to  a  reach  of  coiling  surf 
Beneath  north  walls,  froth'd  combers  alabastrine 
Of  crystal-shimmering  foam-frost  in  the  sun, 
Poised  in  pulsation  overpeer  the  pure, 
Plough-open'd  lane  like  pendulant,  frore  fringe 
Stalactic  bordering  jaws  of  a  bluff-cove 
Ice-lapp'd  to  stillness ;  yet  filPd  with  the  sun, 
Iridescent,  sparkled  for  a  plenitude 
Of  fire-potential  and  the  spring  to-be. 
Or,  where  on  marsh  crisp  tides  receding  leave 
Air-hung  the  sleety,  crush'd  or  quaking  caves, 
These  with  the  ray'd,  prismatic  sun  shot-through, 
Invigorate,  flush  as  with  a  memory  yet 
Of  June  green  and  the  oat-fields'  flood  gone-by. 
That  lightning'd  life  to-be  with  life-time  lost 

87 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Blends  and  is  intermingled,  lies  transfigured 

In  the  instant,  sun-soak'd  snow-gleam.  Even  the  blind 

Shades  of  sepulchral,  drift-tomb'd  trees  bow'd  down 

By  burden  of  broad  branches,  their  best  dusk 

Yet  bears  to  overbrimming  the  brave  blue 

Of  wind-wash'd,  sun-steep'd  skies  above,  beyond 

Spruce-arches  and  chill-canopied,  dark  boughs. 

That  shine  or  shade  alike,  for  crystalline 

Infusion,  catch  and  care  for,  make  alive 

In  snow-light,  the  wide  life  of  sun-steep'd  space ; 

And  are  in  winter's  wealth  world-reconciled, 

Earth-season'd  to  the  season  of  the  sun. 

Here  on  the  meadow-pool  a  breeze  has  blown 
Clean  the  keen  ice ;  that  winter's  world  below, 
Life  liquid-lens 'd  beneath  the  sun-glazed  plane, 
Shows  clear,  cool,  curiously  with  wavering  glooms, 
Fleck'd  twilights,  flexures  of  conglobing  beams 
On  deep-brown  bottom-mould  like  sheen  and  dance 
Of  shine  on  shallow,  sun-warm'd,  weak-waved  beaches 
In  summer-time  long-gone  of  wrinkling  sands. 
Lo  !  'neath  the  ice  small  caddice-worms  in  sheaths 


88 


HIEMATION 

Aforth  for  foraging  'mid  musty  weeds ; 
Trick 'd  yet  in  greenest  cress ;  that  summer-hued 
They  bide  by  winter's  welfare  ;  nor  alone 
Live  well.   For,  builded  by  the  pool,  quaint  mounds 
Of  muskrats— reed-stalks,  matted  leaves,  shrunk  moss— 
Mass'd  in  old  alder-clumps,  rough-eaved,  with  snow 
Thick-roof'd,  strong-buttress'd ;  that  the  swart  musk- 
rat  sleeps 

Through  long,  wild  nights  whose  very  wildness  yields 
Austerest  comfort,  grim  security 
To  the  domed  lake-dwelling ;  while,  below,  the  lake 
Holds  food,  adventure,  'neath  the  glaze  of  stars ! 
Nor  are  the  fields  untenanted  of  folk 
Through  the  snow-season.   But  the  sifted  snow 
Serves  for  flake-tunnel ;  larder  large  with  nuts, 
Cones,  seeds ;  intricate  labyrinth  of  lithe, 
Paw-padded  passages  —  or  the  prick'd  paths  of  mice, 
Four  feet  close-cluster'd  in  the  leap,  with  tail 
Light-trailing  fine  upon  the  powdery  track ; 
Or  lustier  lift  of  squirrel ;  the  sprawl'd  spur 
Of  a  scrawn'd  crow  scavenging ;  with  here  the  sweep 
Claw-like  of  broad  wing-pens  upon  the  plane 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Of  crystal  pasture ;  and  the  partridge'  low, 
Long,  lazy  lunge  of  stride. 

It  is  the  first  snow.   But  oblivion 

Hides  scarce  the  scars  of  earth.   For  earth  lives  on 

Self-reconciled  with  scars.   For  winter 's  well, 

Vivid,  awake  with  wonderful,  white  strength 

Reveal'd,  prophetic  of  a  snow-born  spring.  — 

Who  would  regret  that  earth  hath  scars  and  aileth 

All  autumn  long ;  when  winter  is  to  heal, 

Make  well  the  ills  of  earth  ;  when  else  were  nought, 

No  winter,  nor  no  nurturing  of  spring  ? 

Who  can  regret  our  mortal  ill,  when  else 

White  sympathy  and  healing  grief's  soft  snow, 

When  else  earth's  peace,  were  meaningless ;  when  health 

Of  soul  and  sanity  of  daylight  thought 

Live  but  by  pain  and  sin ;  when  winter,  spring 

Were  nought  but  by  old  mourning  of  the  mind; 

When  every  mourning  were  by  meaning  joy  ; 

Autumn,  earth-worthy,  for  the  fostering  snow  ?  — 

It  is  the  first  snow.     And  the  scars  of  earth 

Are  cover'd.     But  reveal  thereby  her  soul. 

90 


UNDER  GLASS 

HERE  teems  the  sacred  spark,  earth's  trust  and  troth 

Of  the  splendor  of  the  sun  through  the  sere  season ; 

Lamp  of  the  labor  of  the  sleeping  year.  — 

Stout  pistils,  plumping  ovules,  quickening-sperm'd 

Pollen ;  and  parti-color'd  spurt  of  plumes, 

Petals,  pale  sepals  and  strong,  emerald  spread 

Of  leaf -stalks,  netted,  veinous  for  sluiced  sap 

In  the  cells ;  and  bees  with  workaday,  dim  din 

Transporting,  permeating,  fructifying ! 

Color  and  fragrance  !    Honey-hearted  cups 

For  the  bees  to  seek  and  suck  of !    These  are  priests, 

Torch-bearers,  altar-vestals  incensing 

With  choir  and  chalice  in  the  temple  here 

The  shrine  of  the  splendor  of  the  sun's  own  power, 

The  spark  of  the  full-flare  summer-flame  to-be 

When  worship  spreads  and  springs,  not  sole  within 

Sun-surfeit  of  the  sacristy  but,  there 

Uncloister'd  out  beyond  in  June's  wild  world. 

These  are  the  vestals  of  the  vital  spark, 

Chroniclers,  prophets  of  those  protean  days 


EARLIER  POEMS 

When  strength  was,  strength  shall  be  of  marriage  made 

Now  but  in  nurture  of  the  nobler  few ; 

Poets,  love-devotees  of  the  shrine,  souls  sure 

Of  the  plenitude  and  permanence  of  flux 

Procreant  and  the  patience  of  sun's  power : 

Who  waits  world's  hour  to  work  his  will  in  the  world, 

Working  through  these  who  wonder  at  delay.  — 

Toward  the  sweet,  streaming  sunshine  the  swift  sap 

In  myriad  cells  starts  up,  swells,  splits  the  husk 

Of  thousand  stems,  in  countless  buds  exudes ; 

Breaks  forth;  and,  blossoming,  so  blends  in  air 

With  infinite  beams  through  the  soft-steam'd  sunshine. 

Through  the  sluiced,  swelling  fibres  myriad  beams 

Impenetrate,  impregnate,  burst  to  a  bloom 

The  cell-bound  sap ;  blend  and  are  interblent 

To  mutual  permeation  and  communing, 

Marriage  and  meaning  in  a  myriad  blooms. 

Oxalis  amber,  opening  with  the  shine 

Of  sun  on  the  nigh-translucent  petals,  leans 

Lithe,  arch'd  above  blown  beds  of  violets  swathed 

In  glossiest  leaves.   Bush'd  heliotrope  beside, 

Purpled  dianthus  and  the  wing'd,  white  pea ; 

92 


UNDER  GLASS 

Lance-leaved,  clean  oleander ;  gauze-blown  grape 
Make  marvellous  the  smell  of  air.   And  all 
Draw  from  the  dust  or  damp  of  loam  such  scent, 
Power  and  pulsation  of  sap-union  with 
The  ardency  of  sun's  down-flaming  stream; 
Each  bloom  a  blending  of  the  bloom  of  the  world, 
Ember  and  embryo  of  sun's  procreant  strength 
In  June-time  when  spring  so  to  sap  all  things. 
Jonquil  and  daffodil,  cool,  bulbous  bursts 
Of  the  beauty  and  beaming  of  the  mellow  mould  ; 
Primula  perch'd  and  Psychic  cyclamen, 
Begonia  bunch 'd  in  scarlet  pendants,  velvet, 
Furr'd  cineraria  :  blossoms  scant  of  scent, 
Yet  each  a  bountiful,  bright,  prismic-hued 
Vestment  adorning  light's  self-sacrament 
Through  the  dull  season,  scintillant,  sun-soak'd 
To  fresh,  firm  flash  of  color,  quick  release 
Of  the  dun  loam  in  delight  of  open  gleam. 
And — for  hush'd  honey-smell,  for  honey-hues 
Of  delicate  transparence  umber-fused, 
Yellow-of-lemon,  streak'd,  thrush-throated  white, 
With  flush  and  blush  and  orience  of  rose  — 


93 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Lo,  shrubb'd  azaleas,  flawless  spread  of  bloom 

Fill'd  with  the  bees  and  redolent  of  murmur 

Bland  as  the  anthem  of  a  May ;  but  border'd 

About  with  aureoled  pea-spikes  of  the  broom 

And  baubles  of  the  spined  acacia  clung 

Close  in  interstices  of  twilight,  thick, 

Gloss'd  leaf-thorns ;  all,  symbols  of  some  rebirth 

Of  earth  to-be  and  patience  of  the  passion 

Of  the  frost.   And  broad  along  sun-facing  walls 

Peach,  toned  in  tenderness  of  pink;  or  flooded, 

Organ-voiced  effluence  of  the  bridal-bloom'd 

Blood-orange,  stupefaction,  faith-o'erpowering 

Monstrance  imperial  of  the  priestly  flame's 

Transfiguration  fumed,  yet  cloistrally 

VeiPd  with  the  intimate  incense  tropic-savor 'd 

Of  insect-apt  air-orchids ;  or  chord  re-echoed, 

Pathetic  of  atonement-won,  from  chalice 

Of  lilies  in  still,  paschal  glory,  gold 

Offer'd  for  flame-communion  sap  with  sun ! 

Now  is  the  splendor  of  the  prime  of  these 
Which,  inflorescent,  keep  alight  earth's  lamp 

94 


UNDER  GLASS 

Through  the  sere  season  ;  the  sweet  cycle  of  dreams 

Which  inly  keep  complete  the  sleeping  seeds 

Of  annual  orbit ;  in  whose  heart  the  splendor 

Of  ash-worn  world  is  stored  to  smoulder,  sparkle, 

Spurt  up  and  fling  in  shower  of  brands  awide 

A  conflagration  of  all  earth,  awide 

Through  wood  and  field  and  gardenside ;  secure 

To  seed,  grow  great  and  serve  perennial  wise 

The  splendor  of  sun's  flowering  of  earth ; 

Priests  to  the  permanence  of  priesthood-lore, 

Sun-foster'd  to  make  proselyte  sun's  earth.  — 

Lo  !  seedlings  ranged  of  tissuey  green  in  rows, 

Slips,  scions,  novices  of  cloistral  nurture 

Clipp'd  from  the  culture  of  earth's  green  gone-by 

For  green  June-holiday  and  festival. 

Lo  !  and,  without  in  the  world,  wind,  big  with  life 

Got  of  the  south,  transfuses  air  with  savor 

And  sweetness  of  the  steam-exuding  loam. 

Snow  swoons  and  fades  from  off  the  fields.   A  flush 

Of  rose-warm,  amber,  opaline  blush-tints 

Shimmers  through  tree-tops  with  the  bloom  and  burst 

Of  sap  through  cells  and  sheaths  of  the  swelling  bud. 

95 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Lo !  is  the  torch  alight ;  and  world  awakes 
To  efflorescence.   And  the  trust  and  troth, 
Lamp  of  the  labor  of  the  sun,  earth's  gospel 
Of  priest  and  cloister  and  the  culture  pluck'd 
Of  poet-spirits  and  sun's  choicest  souls; 
The  faith  of  the  few  in  patience  of  the  power 
Of  sun  who  works  his  will  in  will  of  the  world ; 
The  faith  of  the  prophets  of  re- birth  of  earth  : 
How  strength,  which  was  and  shall  be,  still  lives  on 
By  permanence  of  passing;  stands  fulfill'd! 


THE  GARDEN  OF  THE  GULF 

OVER  the  wide  sea  a  warm,  wild  wind  sweeping 
Sweet,  swift  and  mild  makes  of  the  foam  froth-flowers 
Quick,  mild  and  moist ;  a  showery  foliature 
Of  soft,  salt-scented  blossoming,  a  budding, 
Blooming  and  frost-like  withering-away 
White  on  the  swirl  of  ocean  blue  in  the  sun. 
There  are  wild  clouds  shower-laden,  sooth  and  dank 
Like  froth  over  the  blue  sky  scurrying  swept ; 
Aloft,  foam  flowering  forth  from  the  wide  wind 
Out  of  its  warm,  south  bosom  ;  a  swift  budding, 
Blooming  and  withering  through  the  atmosphere  — 
Ocean  and  azure  sky  alike  one  garden 
Of  vaporous  iridescence,  shower  and  shine 
For  mist  sunsaturate,  for  petals  woven 
Of  watery  woof  by  sun's  fine  fingering : 
Seasons  successive,  surge,  burst,  bloom,  collapse ; 
One  multitudinous  verdure,  momently 
Full-orbited  in  elemental  year. 

There  are  quick  hearts  and  wild  in  sea's  wide  garden 

97 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Leaping  like  light  and  wonder  of  sunbeams 

From  flower  to  flower  foam-crested.     These  with 

whirr 

Of  whistling  wings  and  whispering,  lithe  flight 
Flash  silvery-vivid  ;  here,  there,  everywhere 
One  sheen,  one  hush'd  incitement  of  desire 
For  tingling,  froth-like  life.     These  dash  and  drown 
In  honey-hearts  of  the  salt-scented  drift 
Their  crystal  fire  and  flame.   On  crystalline, 
Cool  spume  they  pasture  and  the  lambent  lapse 
Fluorescent,  molten  of  blown  pollen-dust 
Spray'd  from  the  crests  of  ocean.   Such  wing'd  fish 
Are  bees  of  the  garden  of  the  gulf.  —  The  clouds 
Feed,  too,  their  wing'd  life.    For  the  stream  of  the 

sky 

Gleams  with  the  glint  of  white  plumes,  in  sunshine 
Snow-like  against  the  blue,  but  in  the  bosom 
Of  the  cloud-hearts  like  bees  or  butterflies 
Lost  quite  for  lightning  of  the  chalice.   These 
Call  and  make  voice  of  the  wild  wind's  delight 
Tumultuous,  flung  down  from  the  torn  and  tossing 
Petals  gale-shaken  of  the  azure  vault : 


THE  GARDEN   OF  THE  (SULF  " 

Meanings  of  waters  and  wide  winds  and  all 

Mingled  in  motion  of  gulf's  guardians, 

The  great  gulls  angel-wing'd.  And  multitude 

Of  purpled,  tremulous  shadowings  deep  down 

In  hyalescence  of  the  quivering  seas 

Show  burrowings  of  slow-throbb'd,  subaqueous  lives, 

Low  'mid  the  matted  roots  of  the  wave-blossoms 

Nurtured  in  cool  and  dimness  of  the  deep. 

And  along  ocean's  weltering  rush  and  roar 

Frail,  wingless,  globose,  iridescent  things 

Swirl,  spread  like  bubbles  bladdery  down  the  flow 

Of  waves  and  winds,  feeding  from  out  the  foam 

With  deft,  long  feelers.   And  these  ever  flow 

And  faint  not.   But  perpetual  frailty  of 

These  whirl'd  seeds  through  the  sea's  sere  agitation 

Makes  of  their  faintness  strength  and  permanence 

To  feed  and  fill  well  from  the  unwithering, 

Live  plash  and  lapsing  of  the  gulf's  great  stream  ; 

To  pasture,  feed  full  of  the  great  gulf's  strength, 

Of  bud  and  burst  and  withering  of  foam-blossoms 

(Blood-beats  perpetual-born  of  ocean's  power 

Powerless ;  one  evanescence  endlessly)  — 

99 


EARLIER  POEMS 

By  equilibration  of  their  life-in-death 

Driven  onward  :  as  the  great  waves  lift  and  fall 


100 


Ill 

POEMS  PSYCHOLOGICAL 


THE  SWIMMER 

DROWN  I  ?  —  Nay,  I  attain  and  am  with  thee 

Safe  from  the  flood,  and  young  and  strong  and  warn* 

To  love ;  who  seem'd  but  then  so  cramp'd  and  old, 

Cold  and  with  boding  as  of  Styx  in  me, 

Chill'd  for  the  Hellespontine  flux  and  foam  ; 

Till,  lo !  call'd  I  on  thee  and  once  again 

Struck  firmly  forth  and  clove  to  the  far  shore 

So  swift  I  felt  not  effort !  —  At  thy  feet 

Now  let  me  lie  and  dream  a  deathless  love  ! 

Yea,  for  we  are  as  gods  !  Had  I  but  drown'd 
Dreaming  on  thee,  were  Hades  hurtless  to  me ; 
Only  pale  immortality  of  love ; 
Thine  image  faint  and  frail  ever  before  me 
As,  lo  !  thou  sittest  fair  —  and  frail  and  pale ; 
Now,  now,  I  ween,  half-fading  so  before  me 
Here  on  the  dim  shore  by  the  dark-faced  flood  ! 
Ay,  as  thou  fadest !  (And  I  marvel  much 
How  thou  shouldst  fade  thus.)   Thus  the  love  in  me 
Would  bide  —  half-faint  —  as  now  faint  1,  half-loveless, 

103 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Here  before  thee !  —  Ah,  losing  love,  like  sense 
Of  thy  white  image  and  of  dark-faced  sea, 
Dim  shore ;  yea,  losing  all :  as  though  I  drown'd, 
Not  grasp 'd  thee !  — 

Though,  in  sooth,  I  scarce  could  grieve 
Loss  even  of  life  !  — 

Nought  now :  love,  shore  nor  flood 
Nor  thou  — 

Who  art  thou  ?  What  wert  thou  ?  What  shore  ? 
What  flood  ?  — 

'  Up  bubbles  all  his  amorous  breath.' 


104 


CARRION 

A  PAIN  of  the  sun,  piercing  with  beak  and  claw ! 
A  vulture-tearing,  back,  above  in  the  brain  !  — 

Eternal  tramping,  tramping  !   Ceaselessly 

The  forward  lift  of  the  foot ;  the  forward  swing ; 

The  forward  footfall :  but  to  lift  again  ! 

Ever  the  body  forward  bent ;  ay,  bent, 

I  say,  by  burden  of  the  pack  too  huge 

For  human,  soldierly  uprightness :  yet 

The  spirit  human,  still  human-erect ; 

Forward,  ceaselessly  forward  !   Here  in  the  sun 

I  toil,  still  lifting,  swinging,  plodding :  aye 

Eternal  tramping,  tramping  ;  effort  still 

Immitigable,  nigh  intolerable, 

Yet  unremittent ;  ever  energy  !  — 

The  day  wears.   There  was  once  a  white-hot  way 

Of  sands  and  sands,  blistering  the  soles ;  struck  up 

Glittering,  ah,  insufferably  glared 

Against  these  eye-balls.   That  was  long  ago. 

There  was  a  stagnant  jungle-side,  lagoon'd 

105 


EARLIER  POEMS 

And  evil-smelling,  glistening  horridly, 

Unguently  bristling  serpentwise  with  fangs 

And  poison-virulent  pestilence.   That  was 

Long  ago.    There  were  multitude  of  men 

My  comrades,  scuffling  up  the  pungent  dust, 

Tramp,  tramp,  through  mouth  and  nostrils  parchingly : 

A  suffocation.   That  was  long  ago. 

Men  dropp'd  by  the  way ;  were  left  there  where  they 

fell: 

They  could  no  more  endure.    (There  was  a  bird 
Descending  on  the  dead  !)   I  still  endure. — 
Now  is  no  road,  no  jungle-side,  no  troop 
Marching ;  but  this  intolerable  sun 
Which  tears  the  vital  brain  with  beak  and  claw. 
There  was  a  space,  the  shivering  road  uprear'd 
Stark  in  the  face  of  me.   I  flung  it  back, 
O'er-pushing,  clambering,  plunging  with  my  soles 
And  shoulders  till  the  energy  of  thrust 
Levell'd  the  way.   Which  forthwith  rear'd  anew, 
Front  to  face  striking  me.  'T  was  long  ago.  — 
No  road,  no  front-to-face  blockade  :  but  feet 
Steadily  lifting,  swinging,  falling  on 

1 06 


CARRION 

Forward  !   And  only  I  am  here  with  the  sun 
Which  pierces  as  'twould  burst  into  the  brain.  — 

What  piecemeal  tearing  vulturewise !   What  rip 
And  rend  of  the  scalp  and  cartilage  !  —  I  turn  ; 
Ward-off  the  ray  with  wrist  and  arm,  defend 
Face  from  the  onslaught ! — Whence  this  dusk  I  clutch  ? 
This  solid,  struggling  blackness  like  a  throat  ? 
Choked  ?  Strangled  ?  —  Stretch'd  in  the  startling  night 

lie  I : 
Death-grip  of  mine  o'  the  gorge  would  feast  too  soon  ! 


107 


THE  NOVICE 

SOUL  that  this  incense  stifles  !  Suddenly 

Seem  candle,  censer,  e'en  the  cross  we  crave, 

But  mummery,  a  tinsel  and  display 

Where  ne'er  were  substance.  Fling  the  casement  wide ; 

Let  the  unpainted  moon,  the  vital  air 

Of  alpine  altitudes,  absolve  this  cell, 

Purify  vestments  of  the  charnel-smoke 

And  signify  a  true  sublimity 

Of  inward  freedom.   How  these  grisly  peaks 

Bear  aloft  horn'd  and  jutted  crags  to  be 

A  world  of  fearless  godlessness ;  a  scene 

Of  desolation  verily,  but  grim 

With  irony  at  any  orphanage, 

With  stern  rebuke  upon  us  hearts  who  seek, 

Bereaved,  a  god  —  by  slavish  worldlessness. 

Yet  are  we  greater  than  our  worldlessness, 
Greater  than  such  unorphan'd,  godless  world  : 
Who  learn  our  orphanage  nor  faint  from  it. 
Lo  !  I  will  forth  into  world-orphanage 

108 


THE  NOVICE 

Of  freedom,  will  be  willess  slave  no  more 
To  innocence,  mystery  and  God.   I  crave 
To  learn  aright  night  and  this  earnest  moon 
Of  alpine  effluence  ;  and  be  as  one 
Of  these  crags.    Only,  in  the  new  resolve, 
Let  me  be  potent  as  nor  crags  nor  moon, 
Knowing  world's  good  and  evil,  freedom  and 
World's  fear  of  freedom.   Let  me  be  alone 
Knowing  my  loneliness ;  not  then,  as  erst, 
Lone  yet  deluded  to  companionship 
Of  stale  chimeras.  — 

Hark  !  —  Yon  bell,  which  tolls 
The  servitude  ;  and  then  these  cringing  cliffs 
Which  chilly  echo  back  the  master-tone, 
Quavering  the  white  light !  How  the  rich  tints  seem 
To  glow  again  unto  the  note  that  clangs 
All  nature  to  the  sacrifice:  obey'd 
Even  by  these  alpine  altitudes  since  men 
Have  pray'd  and  praised  these  numberless,  long  years  ! 
Shall  dominance  be  ended?   Shall  there  be 
No  iterance,  no  sequent  voice  to  call 
Insanities  down  to  the  nightly  stint 

109 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Of  labor,  weariness  and  rest  in  faith 

That  truths  are  otherwise,  that  all  we  know 

Of  beetling  precipice  and  direst  blast 

Are  symbol,  and  the  substance  not  yet  shown 

Nor  understood  e'en  of  obedience? 

Pardon  lip-blasphemy  !  —  Behold,  I  turn 

Dumb  from  my  casement.   Let  the  moon  or  stars 

See  me,  if  they  in  any  wise  can  see, 

Sink  to  my  knees  here  of  my  cell  alone, 

In  full  and  reverent  companionship 

With  this  dead  idol  whom  my  lips  and  heart 

Still  shall  obey.    Close  but  the  cold  air  out ! 

It  chills.   I  am  not  fit  for  that  live  world 

Of  fatherlessness  and  yon  moon-gleam 'd  snows. 

I  should  not  know,  I  cannot  dare  conceive 

A  self-reliance  beyond  orphanage  ; 

Day's  light  that  needs  no  lamp ;  a  freedom  aye 

Responsible  through  every  concrete  act.  — 

Let  there  seem  emptiness  beyond  this  pale. 

Be  there  but  incense ;  God :  and  me,  His  slave  ! 


no 


THE  VIOLINIST 

SO-FASHION,  son  !  Sweep  the  stroke  smooth  and  suave 

As  folks  approve  ;  not  with  such  downright  strength 

Of  splendid  earnestness  !  T  were  dubb'd  grotesque  !  — 

Oh,  but  't  is  genius,  power  beyond  your  sphere  !  — 

We  learn  to  bow  well,  learn  to  fret  the  string 

Quite  at  the  common  and  established  nodes, 

Fit  for  performance  tickling  eye  and  ear 

Of  the  dilettanti,  for  attenuating 

Some  truth  authoritative  set  before  us 

Just  to  be  reinterpreted  to  them 

(The  blind  and  deaf  to  need  such  minist'ring), 

Not  re-created.   Far  less,  lift  we  up 

Feeling  and  fancy  (might  I  call  it  soul  ?) 

For  self -creation  !  —  So,  so-fashion,  son  ! 

Play  the  piece  deftly  by  the  establish'd  mode, 

Press  to  the  pale  perfection,  seek  technique  — 

But  no  creation  !  Son,  forget  the  soul ! 

Ah,  could  but  men  be  more  musicianly ; 
Hear  once  the  fiddling,  not  a  thousand  times 

in 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Thus  re-demand  it ;  ah  !  ignore  all  else 

In  rapture  of  the  unrepeating  score 

Soul-comprehended,  free  from  sense  at  last 

By  understanding  of  the  visual  sign 

Through  one  performance'  pedagogy  learn'd 

Forever,  as  we  learn  sans  any  sound 

To  read  and  be  at  benefit  by  book  — 

By  breve  and  semi-breve,  by  staff  and  point 

Set  silent  here,  yet  eloquent  beyond 

Any  distress  of  horse-hair,  gut  and  board  ; 

Free  from  mere  sense ;  free  even  to  surpass 

Yon  score  authoritative ;  yea,  to  create 

Fresh  music,  inwardly  indifferent  how 

The  master  made  the  old  tune  ;  tuning  yet 

A  phrase  which  savors  of  the  master-make 

By  very  virtue  of  original 

Audacity  !  —  Ay,  thus  have  I,  my  son, 

In  the  strong  spirit  of  hours  as  keen  as  yours 

Years  gone,  betook  me  to  the  garret  (great 

With  enterprise  — was  it  the  genuine, 

High  genius  ?)  where  alone,  unheard  my  bow 

Fell  noiseless,  nor  would  fingers  ache  and  smart 

112 


THE  VIOLINIST 

Nor  eye  grow  blurry  with  the  plaguing  page ; 

But  music  entering  silently  fill  all 

Reaches  and  confines  of  an  universe  — 

Young  once  and  dreaming  of  an  art  at  birth 

And  radiant ;  which  aye  is  for  the  few 

God -gifted ;  nay,  which  is  not  yet,  my  son. 

Ah,  but  the  rapture  and  the  dreaming  made 

An  agony  of  every  torturing  rote 

So  keen,  so  piercing,  that —  I  earn  my  salt, 

Reputed  skilful  at  my  trade,  a  craftsman 

Well-paid  and  well-applauded.  —  Yea,  my  son, 

Ours  is  not  greatness,  high  musicianship 

Of  self-dependence  openly  unique ; 

But  minist'ring  which  shall  be  greatly  meant! 

Dream  generous  dreams,  be  genius,  genuine 

As  may  be  ;  nor  forget  the  soul !  But  let 

The  agony  of  soul-relinquish'd  (lost 

Incessantly  and  irremediably), 

Shot-through  the  quivering  tones,  teach  unaware 

This  throng  an  hint  of  splendor  earth  shall  learn 

In  other  times  by  other  strengths.   Be  yours 

The  splendor  even  in  forswearing  it !  — 

113 


EARLIER   POEMS 

'  Work,  be  unhappy  ',  but  believe  !  —  Even  so, 
So-fashion  suavely  sweep  the  bow ;  achieve 
A  recognised  interpreting  :  but  let 
Earnestness  twinge  you  to  the  finger-tips, 
Music  be  misery :  that  your  tragedy 
Be  power !  Let  soul  but  rend  you,  rote  by  rote ! 


114 


ONE  WAY  OF  GRIEF 

KIND  sir,  I  am  a  strong,  stout-working  man, 
Bold  to  bear  sorrow  —  may  such  sorrow  fall 
As  mine  on  you  nor  yours  !  You  see,  I  stand 
Shaken,  unstrung ;  even  though  your  sure  support 
Steadies  me  somewhat.  Whence  you  found  me  stretch 'd 
Here  on  the  stiff,  stark  ground — I  thank  you,  sir  — 
I  could  not,  though  I  tried  till  dawn,  have  raised 
Body  of  mine  but  for  your  lifting  hand. 
For  sorrow,  sleeplessness  and  least  of  food 
Weaken  the  well  and  strong  till  they  like  me 
Weep  as  a  child.  —  We  buried  her,  my  child, 
Today.   And  the  week's  work  is  done.  —  I  came 
Forth  in  this  chill  and  comfortless  night-air 
Under  these  strange,  far  stars  and  heartless  moon 
Here  by  the  still  trees  for  the  comfort,  sir ; 
Their  calm,  so  to  be  friends  with  and  grow  calm  — 
Out  of  my  cottage.   For,  within,  no  stool, 
No  patch  of  carpet  but  cries  out  her  curls, 
Her  lips  and  angel-laugh  too  clear  and  cured 
Of  earth  for  captive  in  my  cottage.  —  Sir, 


EARLIER   POEMS 

How  came  God  grant  a  gift  too  good  to  keep  ?  — 

No  bit  of  homeliness  and  everyday 

Where  she  sat,  play'd  her  plays  or  croon'd  her  tunes, 

Snatches  of  song  her  own ;  where  she  with  broom 

Of  fit,  small  size  swept,  dusted  ever  after 

The  clean-swept  footsteps  of  her  mother !  —  Oh, 

She  had  been  sweeping  in  the  passage  (just 

Five  days  ago,  'twas  Monday),  proud  and  full 

Of  busiest  house-work,  whilst  I  sat  nor  saw 

My  morning's-news  but  casually  made  sport, 

Joked  at  her  six-year  zeal  as  fathers  use, 

Her  tireless  will  to  work  for  work's  sole  sake 

(No  need  of  any  end  or  aim  for  work, 

Loved  ones  to  work  for,  which  we  fathers  need) :  — 

"You  '11  scarce  work  life-time  long  with  such  a  will, 

Eh,  child  ?  "  But  she  :  "  Father !  "  —  she  ran  and  wept 

Wailingly  :  "Father,  what  so  hurts  my  head  ?  "  — 

Then,  she  to  bed  in  stupor ;  nor  awaked 

Save  in  delirium,  sir ;  nor  knew  me  more. 

The  mother  ?  Stricken  from  the  first ;  but  breathes, 

Lives,  lies  within  —  'tis  of  the  child  I  speak. 

Sir,  you  will  say  she 's  better-off,  now  dead, 

116 


ONE   WAY   OF  GRIEF 

Than  ever  I  could  make  her  —  surely,  sir  — 

If  saved  such  sorrow's  possibility 

And  loss  of  all  to  work  for !  —  Sir,  she  was 

Our  only  child.   I  used  to  read  her  tales 

Of  elves  and  goblins,  talking  trees  —  my  rearing 

Brought  me  to  knowledge  of  old-country  lore 

And  woodland  fairy-facts.   She  'd  sit  and  hear, 

Say  nothing  ;  yet  a  seven-night  thence  she  'd  sing 

The  whole  tale  word  for  word  from  first  to  end 

Straight  out  of  memory  to  a  wonder-tune ! 

Every  man,  every  woman  loved  my  child. 

I,  sir,  alone  of  men,  my  wife  alone 

Of  women  knew  what,  every  morn,  it  meant 

To  wake  at  half-dream'd  laughter,  some  soft  whisper 

Whirring  about  our  room  on  wings  from  out 

Her  crib  beside  the  bed  ;  safely  to  stretch 

A  hand  and  feel  her  two  fists  fasten  mine 

To  cheek  and  sleep  thus,  that  I  might  not  move. 

Sir,  there  's  no  tale  nor  fairy-song  now  five 

Long  nights,  nor  morning-whisper  nor  love-laugh 

In  the  cottage.  — No,  nor  sleep  for  me  nor  mine  ; 

Nor  shall  be  sleep  till  we  sleep  with  our  child  !  — 


117 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Sir,  I  detain  you ;  thank  you,  sir !  There  's  wood 
To  fetch  in  yet  for  the  night  —  my  wife  needs  care. 
Ah  yes,  I  've  ample  work  to  do  —  my  wife 
Should  die  of  this ;  and  meanwhile  she  wants  care. 
Sir,  I'll  be  strong  again  and  tend  my  wife  ; 
Fetch  in  the  wood.    But,  sir,  save  for  my  wife 
I  've  nothing.   When  she  dies  of  this,  I  '11  be 
But  more  unmann'd  ;  only  more  like  to  bide 
Here  as  you  found  me  prone  without  on  the  ground, 


118 


THE  HERMIT 

AY,  't  is  a  desolate  twilight.   The  dull  rain 

Drops  large  in  isolated  clots  upon 

The  soggy  leaf-floor.  And  the  leaves  o'er-head 

Shut  out  all  sky  save  momently  a  cloud 

Caught  in  the  pine -tops,  choked  and  sobbing  there. 

Ay,  'tis  a  dismal  time.  Yet  just  a  thrush, 

Huddled  and  sogg'd  as  any  old,  brown  leaf, 

Makes  music.   And  I,  crouch'd  below  in  the  dusk, 

Clasp  close  this  rough  trunk,  hush'd  as  any  tree 

And  moveless  save  for  drip  and  serious  splash 

Of  the  constant  rain  on  brow  and  breast ;  am  here 

(Until  your  coming,  brisk,  in  comradeship  !) 

Alone  with  fog  and  forest  and  this  thrush.  — 

Loud,  sir :  the  song  has  ceased  !    I  care  not  now 

What  wild  thing  else  we  startle,  scare  to  wing 

Or  covert;  but  will  sludge  along  with  you 

Supperward,  head  bow'd,  feet  at  stalwart  crunch 

And  rotty  crackle  over  quick  and  dead 

Of  the  wood-floor.  What  care  I  ?  You  are  no  thrush  ! 


119 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Nay,  friend ;  you  sure  are  more  than  any  thrush  — 

Yet  somewhat  weak  at  woodcraft  —  say,  too  strong 

In  sundry  human  sympathies  to  heed 

The  tragedy  of  thus  unsympathizing : 

As  I  feel  tragedy  in  being  a  man 

Here  and  alone  with  thrush,  twilight  and  storm. 

You  prefer  friends  intelligible,  shun 

Contact  of  creatures  whose  society 

Is  no  society  in  sort  humane  ? 

You  prefer  interchange  of  word  and  look 

Couch 'd  in  communicant  convention,  scarce 

This  isolation  which  we  woodsmen  know?  — 

Slowly  !  —  And  plod  not  on  that  herb  !  —  Take  heed 

First  of  the  primitive  companionship 

We  find  of  the  forest,  very  like  indeed 

To  human  sociability,  with  certain 

Spice  of  an  unsophistication,  plain 

Expression  of  opinion,  even  if  less 

Elaborate  in  the  communal  interchange  ! 

Though  first  I  will  admit  —  he  sings  again, 

Hark !  in  the  far  depths  (nay,  I  stick  with  you!)  — 

120 


THE  HERMIT 

There 's  nothing  in  the  forest  that 's  not  found 

In  measure  richlier,  wiselier,  maybe, 

In  civilization ;  I  am  no  forsworn, 

Unforlorn  hermit  falsely  hermit-like; 

Yet  feel  the  fortune  of  yon  hermit-bird  : 

Feeling  the  counter-implication  how 

Nor  isolation  nor  companionship 

Be  predicate  of  forest-lore  alone 

Nor  sole  of  man's  society  :  but  both 

Are  shared.   There  's  interchange  of  word  and  look 

Scarce  less  complete  in  forest-lore  than  man's 

Society,  if  but  our  estimate 

Of  satisfactory  conference  in  each 

Be  based  in  ratio  to  the  tragic  rift 

Respectively,  take  for  criterion 

The  isolation  which  we  woodsmen  know, 

In  this  our  woodcraft,  from  these  forest-things 

No  more  intensely  nor  preponderantly 

Than  human  failures  at  a  fellowship  ! 

Maybe,  't  is  the  pettiness  in  this  our  rift 

Of  the  woods  which  forces  on  us  to  the  marrow 

The  civilization-tragedy :  if  more 

121 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Society  in  humans,  then  the  worse 
The  inevitably  incompatible 
Failure  to  comprehend,  be  mutual 
In  men's  assemblages  —  for  me,  for  you. 

Tomorrow,  haply,  may  I  revel  in 

The  splendor,  as  the  tragedy :  not  now  !  — 

Friend,  gripe  mine  arm !   There  's  somewhat  in  this 

dusk 

That  sets  me  staggering,  that  craves  a  crutch  ! 
Thanks,  thanks  !  you  are  stiff  of  foot  to  straighten  me 
And  act  my  staff  ?  —  Someway  the  loneliness 
Of  noblest  wood-communion  but  makes  more 
Frightful-intense  the  apperception  of 
Our  human  loneliness,  our  fuller  commune 
We  flaunt  so  glibly.  —  Yonder  is  the  camp  ? 
That  flare  means  man's  civility  ?  —  Chaff  loud  ; 
Laugh-off  the  supper  and  the  bedward  time 
With  forced  free-fellowship  :  for  fear  I  '11  dream 
A  thrush  sings  through  the  hermitage  of  men  ! 


122 


AN  ORNITHOLOGIST 

'  WHAT  overbillowing  of  a  melody  mad'  ? 

<  What  untamed  music '  ?   Oh,  their  very  names 

Mean  each  such  twittering  outburst  rapturous 

Of  strange,  abrupt,  ingenuous  euphony  ! 

Lark,  oriole,  bobolink :  to  title  them 

Is  song.    '  Yet  surely  not  for  sheer  bird-song 

Haste  you  and  hearken  oft  in  the  fields  at  dawn'  ? — 

Patience,  a  moment  (yes,  the  tune  of  the  thrush)  ! 

I  'm  ruffled  a  bit,  maybe,  and  must  a  little 

Out-talk  the  art  you  'd  scarce  appreciate  ; 

Who  come  to  me  for  guide  expert  toward 

A  half-sung  trend  of  tones,  unfmish  of  notes 

You  sneer  a  slur  to,  ere  depart  with  dream 

More  or  less  disillusionized  :  man's  music 

Shown  more  sophisticated  (cat-bird ;  robin  — 

Mark  both!)  so  better  satisfying  !  Friend, 

I  see  a  fall  of  the  face  in  you,  not  all 

Due  to  my  voluble  impertinence 

But  some  to  the  songs  (an  oven-bird  :  loud,  loud  !) 

You  hear,  perhaps,  for  the  first  time.   Your  own  voice  - 

123 


EARLIER  POEMS 

I  like  it  well  —  would  satisfy  you  more. 

Not  that  1  deem  you  ever  would  deny 

(Yon  crow  caws  meaningly)  a  musical 

Value  in  least  to  this  wild  symphony 

You  'd  fain  stop  ears  at,  while  below  my  breath 

Thus  to  make  sure  you  miss  no  worst  of  us  — 

1  garrulously  (the  oriole  repeats  !) 

Extemporize.   These  ritornelles,  roulades 

(Nay,  listen  the  bubbling  goldfinch  !)  liquidly 

Lifted  aquiver  in  tremulous  air,  were  worth 

Elaboration  or  analysis 

With  much  among  the  lyric-laughs  of  men  ? 

And  yet  (that  yellowhammer  'tis  that  squeals) 

Not  musically  satisfying,  should 

Music  be  measured  by  mere  complexity, 

A  less  and  more  sheerly,  of  bird's  to  man's! 

To  me,  forsooth,  there  seems  an  interest 

Nerve-occupying  as  with  an  increment 

Of  complication  —  though  the  practice  wants 

Comparatively  in  variety 

Of  juxtapositions  possible  betwixt 

The  variables,  so  is  per  se  simplex  — 

124 


AN   ORNITHOLOGIST 

In  the  junction,  human  practice  is  not  chain'd-to, 

Of  timbre-change  each  with  a  pitch-change,  sith  the 

bird  — 

No  two  alike,  maybe  ;  yet  all,  in  sort  — 
Alters  the  tang  too  with  each  rise  or  fall 
Of  the  scale  —  't  is  quaint,  't  is  taking  !   Yet  indeed 
I  blame  you  not;  I,  rather,  were  the  first 
(Appreciating  Brahms,  Dvorak  or  Grieg 
In  terms  above  those  trailing  geese  at  squawk 
High  in  the  blue,  north -streaming  over  the  sun!) 
To  forswear  scarce-articulate  ecstacies  — 
It  pricks  me  at  the  heart  to  spoil  them,  though  !  — 
Fit  for  the  forests,  haply,  but  for  man 
Childish  as  chuckle  of  that  chickadee  : 
Not  but  that  there  's  some  manhood  in  a  child  !  — 
Yet,  hark  !  a  song-sparrow ;  of  all  souls  of  spring 
The  very  quick  quintessence  !  —  Feel  you,  sir, 
No  soul  in  music,  an  overunity 
Ne'er-so  complex'd ;  no  personal  infinite 
Or  man's  or  bird's  equally  live  and  free  ? 
A  self  still  self-express 'd  — even  as  mine 
Tormenting  yours  —  a  truth,  nor  more  nor  less 

125 


EARLIER  POEMS 

But  absolute-like  each  personal  containment, 

Or  bird's  or  man's  ;  if  only  made  mine-own  ? 

A  self,  though  less  by  the  bird  elaborate 

In  cosmic-couch 'd  projection,  just  thereby 

Serving  comparison  for  base,  for  a  mordant 

Of  Wagner's  tones  as  subtler  than  yon  jay's  : 

A  self  conspicuous,  if  by  dint  of  foiling 

The  piteous  bird-inadequacy  more, 

In  bird  as  man  !  And,  though  you  hear  for  same 

Within  the  type  of  the  species  many  songs 

Enough  unlike  to  him  who  hearkens  them, 

Yet  how  diverse  these  species  which  approve 

The  world-soul !   With  what  utmost  piquancy  — 

As  not  in  men  whose  much  similitude 

Of  caution  and  conservatism  cultured 

Leads  ear  to  expect  the  soul-identity  !  — 

Of  pure  self -utterance  'mid  these  radiant  dews 

And  mildmist-manners  of  the  sun  salutant 

Here  o'er  the  low  ground,  with  all  upper  air 

At  tremble,  vibrant :  world-enthusiasm 

Of  a  birdness !  (Hush  !  My  bobolink  again  ! ) 


126 


AN  ASTRONOMER 

I  LIFT  mine  eyes  unto  the  stars  whence  cometh 

Help  to  the  judgment  of  an  universe, 

Unto  the  stars;  and  find  their  piercing  sight  — 

So  crisp,  so  shimmering-keen  of  this  night-frost !  — 

My  light  as  theirs  :  and  mine  the  estimate.  — 

Long  have  I  known  and  taught  that  what  we  call 

Copernican  of  divers  vortices 

And  various  orbits  quite  doth  supersede 

The  Ptolemaic  of  the  vaulted  spheres 

Arch'd  over  earth  for  fulcrum ;  long  have  taught, 

Yet  never  till  this  solitary  hour 

Guess'd  the  true  contrast  nor  conceived  the  law 

That  regulates  and  reconciles  both  schemes 

Of  Ptolemy  as  of  Copernicus 

To  one  soul-systeming.   The  hour—  this  calm, 

Crystalline,  steel-clamp'd,  deep,  mid-winter  night ; 

The  place  and  occupation  —  this  untamed, 

Invigorating  wilderness  wherein 

I  tread  untrodden  paths  and  track  the  world 

As  the  first  maker  though  the  way  be  worn ; 

127 


EARLIER   POEMS 

The  hour,  the  place  and  occupation  all 

Conduce  to  clarification  ;  where  this  light 

Of  star  on  snow-crust  yields  me  estimate 

Of  crust  or  star.    I  centre  here  alone 

Earth  and  the  sundry  spheres  alike,  by  feeling 

Intensely  so  these  vortices  of  sight ; 

Am  Ptolemaic  or  Copernican 

By  rich  admission  of  the  counter-scheme 

Appropriately.    Hitherto  I  clave 

To  the  one,  condemn'd  the  other.    Now  I  cherish 

Both  equally ;  who  first  have  found  right  place 

For  either.  —  Is  it,  I  have  but  just  become 

Under  the  inspiration  of  this  frost 

And  star-shine  such  philosopher,  as  erst 

I  would  not  be ;  transcending,  after  years, 

The  unsoul'd  star-science  ;  by  heart-estimating 

Star-shine,  establishing  truth's  over-fact  ? 

How  long  I  had  taught,  old  Ptolemy  were  crude, 

First-felt  confusion  ;  and  Copernicus 

(Or  call  it  Kepler,  who  may  heed  the  name  ?) 

A  realization  and  interpreting 

Of  the  fact  in  absolute  fact-evidence, 

128 


AN   ASTRONOMER 

Sense-proven  logic !   Such  in  sooth  they  are, 

I  allow  it  yet,  if  sheerly  outward  fact 

Be  all  the  evidence ;  nor  the  estimate, 

Judgment  itself,  the  sense  to  feel  the  fact, 

Be  equal  evidence  !    How  deep  I  had  felt 

The  dignity  and  grandeur  of  the  change 

From  the  old-supposed,  self-centralizing  man, 

False  pivot  of  the  sun  and  stars  and  skies, 

To  the  mere  man-item  !    Now  and  suddenly 

I  avow  this  very  dignity  for  warrant 

Of  proper  pride,  a  self-respect  achieved 

Beyond  fact-deprecation ;  pride  wherethrough 

Alone  this  universe  of  self-neglect 

Can  take  its  ground.    In  faith,  the  change  were  then 

A  dignity  and  grandeur  past  compare 

(An  overmanhood  yet  within  the  man) 

If  thus  interpreted  ;  though  otherwise 

True,  only  were  the  spirit  measured  quite 

By  lore  too  crude  to  comprehend  the  least 

Self-continence  of  mutual  nebulas  ! 

If  ancient  Ptolemy  (Hipparchus'  heir, 

Eudoxus'  scholar)  did  but  mistranslate 


129 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Philosophy  to  fields  mechanical, 

By  the  confusion  undemark'd  subverting 

Both  disciplines  to  error;  none  the  less 

Did  this  Copernicus  construct  a  scheme 

Of  crude  mechanics  which  we  sycophants 

Have  half-mistook  for  full  philosophy. 

On,  then,  from  both.  —  And  sith  these  stars  and  moons 

Are  utterly  indifferent  to  my  mass 

Save  as  I  am  of  these  a  particle 

Thrusting  infmitesimally  (yet 

The  more  by  virtue  of  such  partnership 

And  insignificance,  significant 

As  centre-pivot,  focus,  fulcrum  of 

All  facts  experienced),  so  even  each  least 

Crystal  and  ray-diffusing  molecule 

Of  star-stuff  estimates,  conglomerately 

Systematizes  in  the  mutualism 

Of  apprehension  inly  registrate, 

An  universe  each  of  the  farthest  spheres 

And  some  self-focus.  —  Thus  I  lift  mine  eyes 

Unto  the  stars  whence  ever  cometh  help. 


130 


THE  DIVORCED 

THEY  say  that  you  despised  me,  cheated  me, 
Wrong'd  me,  a  wife  forsaken  and  forlorn.  — 
I  doubt  not  one  sad  word  of  all  they  say. 
Whence,  sith  the  souls  of  many  among  men 
Were  shock'd  beyond  composure  should  I  yield 
To  crime  condonable  and  pardon  you ; 
Whence,  for  the  precedent  of  public  shame, 
I  brought  a  cause  against  you,  made  my  plea, 
Proved  the  avow'd  and  obvious  wrong ;  so  stand 
Clear'd  of  complicity;  redress'd :  divorced  !  — 
Thus  much  for  sop  to  custom  ;  in  cold  eyes 
Convention'd  with  the  vision  of  the  courts 
I  hold  me  reinstated,  rectified. 
Such  for  their  world  of  righteous  wrath  !  —  For  you  ? 

How  might  I  judge  you  ?  I,  who,  in  default 
Of  infinite  intuition,  fail'd  response 
Where  marriage  most  were  inward  unioning  ? 
Who  lack'd  of  filling  up  that  life  of  love 
Spiritual,  inmost,  your  life  needed  most 


EARLIER    POEMS 

Where  least  I  rose  to  rendering  it :  your  want 

Passionate,  intellectual,  ah  !  god-like, 

For  commune  ultimate,  your  soul  with  mine, 

In  beauty  of  a  deep-dream 'd  philosophy  ? 

How  I  aspired  to  meet  you,  yearn  with  you, 

In  you  and  through  you  unto  those  sky-depths, 

Forsooth,  forever  hidden  from  my  ken  ! 

How  I  aspired  !   Yet  could  but  half-discern 

Chill-chisell'd  speculation,  outlines  cold 

Of  marbled  ideality ;  not  feel 

Your  quick,  organic  cosmos,  realize 

Self-consciousness  alive,  complete,  impassion'd, 

Art-whole  in  worldship.  —  Oh  :  how  I  fell  short !  - 

Friends  (I  have  made  such  moan  to)  have  rejoin'd 

"  Yours  the  domestic,  concrete,  vivid  love 

Of  home  and  hearth  and  womanhood  humane, 

The  real,  the  Christian,  the  complete.    His  vague, 

Abstract,  dim,  universalistic  boast 

Of  pagan  self-dependence  leads,  we  know 

And  you  know  —  be  it  your  consoling! — leads 

By  its  own  mystic  emptiness  to  just 

Such  isolation,  aberration,  crime  ! 


132 


THE   DIVORCED 

Comfort  yourself  that  yours  is  not  the  crime  !  " 

Friends,  I  have  made  my  moan  to,  thus  reply 

With  well-meant  mockery.   My  crime  'tis  to  fail 

Response  where  your  love  led  me  nobliest. 

Yours  was  the  limitless  capacity, 

I  ween,  for  leading,  drawing  up  and  on 

(Ah,  could  I  have  made  the  potence  practical !) 

Of  hearth  and  home  and  womanhood  humane 

To  humane  inspiration,  love  complete, 

Concrete,  compassion'd  most  by  widening  out, 

Deepening  down,  transfusing  commonplace 

Sentiment  with  a  world-morality  : 

Christ's  meaning  in  the  marriage  of  two  souls. 

And  I  could  not  be  led,  nor  make  to  mount 

Your  wise  way  —  and  the  breathlessness  was  mine  ! 

Nor,  that  your  faithlessness  in  falling  short 

Of  such  philosophy's  full  working  shows 

(However  vile  the  fall,  still  equal-vile 

In  the  sight  of  each  —  as  your  confession  proves) 

A  flaw  in  the  lute,  a  passion  gone  astray 

Unfunction'd  yet  in  personality 

(Conscience  organic  of  a  moralism)  — 

133 


EARLIER  POEMS 

'Tis  little  !    Tis  but  point  within  your  plea, 

Incomprehensible  to  both  of  us, 

Of  our  miscomprehensions ;  yields  no  rod 

To  wrathlessness ;  nor  any  right  to  judge  you.  — 

I,  whose  own  weakness  wears  the  front  of  yours, 

By  falling  short  of  absolute  matrimony 

(My  failure's  depth  proven  in  your  depth  of  fall) 

Forced  your  philosophy  to  fail  —  like  vice ! 

Dear,  I  rise  now  to  heights  intuitive  — 

Too  late  —  of  intimate  philosophy 

Unguess'd  before ;  feel  passionate  consciousness 

Of  our  soul-unity  when  parted  most ! 

I  have  indeed  contested  suit  to  prove 

Precedents  in  a  world  unready  yet 

To  forego  righteous  wrath  ;  whose  righteous  wrath 

Were  wrong'd  by  less  insistence.   Though,  for  you. 

The  fault  is  felt  mine  from  the  first.   And  loss 

Of  opportunity  to  rectify 

By  reparation  is  my  cross  to  bear.  — 

Cross  ?   'T  is  soul-fate,  self-fate  unto  us  two ; 

Not  punishment  sprung  of  the  cold,  dead  law ! 

134 


THE  DIVORCED 

Quick  fate  stands  immanent  already ;  lives 
Through  inmost  overcoming  in  my  love  !  — 

But  —  for  our  two  sad  life-times  sinn'd  away  ! 


'35 


A  CANDIDATE  FOR  COMMITTAL 

AM  I  the  man  who  thinks  too  much,  whom  dreams 

Have  driven  now  to  uttermost  disgrace, 

Save  for  this  kind  certificate  you  '11  sign 

Soon  as  the  skill'd  examination  's  done  ? 

Certainly  this  is  I ;  as  you  are  he 

I  used  to  know  so  well  in  student-days ; 

We  two  whose  works  diversified  so  wide 

Only  to  bring  us  face  to  face  at  last 

Here,  and  as  now  !    Old  friend,  I  grasp  your  hand  ! 

Strange,  I  am  cheerful,  strong  and  quite  sane  now 

At  sight  of  your  keen,  psychologic  smile 

Working  me  wonders.  —  Sure,  a  strange  mischance 

To  come  quite  sane  of  a  sudden  ;  when  they  say 

'T  is  but  mine  obvious  insanity 

Saves  me  from  ball  and  chain  and  bitter  bread  ! 

And  you,  the  testimonial  expert 

Of  mine  insanity,  who  turn  me  sane  !  — 

Nay,  do  not  interrupt  me  while  I  talk ! 

Let  not  your  friendship  fear  to  find  me  sane, 
136 


A  CANDIDATE   FOR   COMMITTAL 

Friend  !   For  what  can  I  care  ?   Such  plea  of  mine 

Was  nothing  of  my  making.    I  rejoice, 

Now  for  the  first  time,  that  you  scientists 

Know  no  compassion.    (We  philosophers 

Are  all  compassion  to  the  fingers'  ends  !) 

Mine  were  the  crimes,  I  grant,  of  overgreat 

Compassion  ;  charitable  largess  of 

Wealth  not  mine  own ;  misuse  of  misers'  names 

To  play  the  god  with  !  —  Why  excuse  my  crimes  ? 

I  claim  no  least  exemption.   I  am  sane.  — 

Let  us  but  feel  friends'-confidence  once  more 

Despite  the  dismal  years  of  difference 

And  wordy  warfare :  science  on  your  side ; 

Philosophy  on  mine  who  sought  to  prove 

No  gulf  irreconcilable  between  us ; 

Only  a  partial,  preassumed,  abstract 

Finitude  for  the  flaw  of  your  idea, 

Resolved  and  overcome  and  reconciled 

Even  in  the  concrete  unioning  of  mine, 

My  principle  of  infinite,  functional 

Godship  determining  a  self-universe  ! 

'T  is  ne'er  philosophy  that  drives  one  mad ; 

137 


EARLIER  POEMS 

'T  is  falling  short  from  full  belief  in  it 

To  transcend  contradiction,  reconcile 

World-lonely  love  beyond  world-agony, 

Include  insanity  and  make  it  sane. 

I  was  not  firm  philosopher  enough 

To  find  divinity  through  worst  of  dearth ; 

I  was  not  strong  to  bear  the  vast  idea 

Alone,  unaided  of  your  friendliness. 

Then  too  the  combat  and  the  bitter  words ; 

A  world  for  arbiter  betwixt  us  twain, 

Station'd  between  to  separate;  when  heart 

And  brain  as  one — that  friendship  felt  for  you, 

One  with  the  fresh  philosophy  I  loved  — 

Cried  out  how  we  were  reconciled  from  first 

Could  you  but  feel  for  me,  but  of  me  learn  ! 

That  was  the  agony :  to  combat  so 

When  combat  turn'd  both  truths  into  a  lie  !  — 

You  'd  rest  in  fmitude  for  final  fact, 

Accept  self-isolation  undismay'd ; 

Soar  not  to  loneliness,  love's  infinite 

Conscience  of  isolation  ?    Friend,  my  soul 

Needs  reconcile  its  loneliness  or  cease  !  — 


A  CANDIDATE   FOR  COMMITTAL 

Now  't  is  but  cure  for  such-like  suffering, 

My  terrible  loneliness  of  brain  and  blood, 

To  feel  again  your  presence,  know  your  gaze  : 

That  gaze  which  burn'd-through  every  page  you  wrote ; 

Explain  as  now,  mind-intimate  at  last, 

Finally  friend  in  friend  !  —  I  go  to  face 

Judge,  jury,  all  the  court-room  wide  agape 

To  hush  huge  laughter  at  the  mumbling,  marr'd 

Old  man  of  many  marvellous  lunacies ; 

Face  them  nor  fear  them,  fill'd  to  a  firmness  now 

With  health  and  sanity  of  thought  once  more 

(Love's  outlook  of  a  mutuality) ; 

To  front  and  bear  the  brunt  of  what  may  come, 

Disgrace  if  needs  be,  misery  welcome  now 

With  such  a  consciousness  of  you  beyond  ! 

Only  —  your  smile  is  wearing  threadbare,  friend. 
Have  scientists  compassion  after  all  ?  — 
Only :  be  sure  you  stand  not  far  from  me 
There  in  the  court ;  that  I  may  touch  your  hand, 
Feel  friends' -blood  tingle,  see  your  face  in  the  flesh, 
Lest  I  go  mad  once  more  and  scare  them  there. 

139 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Forsooth,  I  am  an  old  and  lonely  man, 

Worn-out  with  too  much  thinking ;  and  my  dreams 

Crowd  on  me  once  again.   You  '11  come  with  me 

Now  into  court  and  sit  beside  me  there 

While  I  show  judge  and  them  how  sane  I  am, 

Braced  by  the  bearing  of  a  man  like  you  !  — 

Truly,  a  fondly-featured  meeting,  friend, 

That  brings  disgrace  in  the  end  on  one  like  me, 

Disgrace  of  too  great  sudden  sanity 

For  a  soul  worn-out  with  wrangling.   Do  we  come  ? 

The  examination  's  over  ?    Though  I  've  told 

Not  one  word  yet  of  how,  when  I  was  mad 

With  loneliness  —  but  that  is  gone-by  now  — 

How  world-compassion  —  but  I  weep,  it  seems  ! 

Come,  friend  !  —  That  paper  in  your  hand,  I  trust, 

Holds  all  I  've  told  you  ?   Your  psychology 

Will  profit  much  by  just  my  case  in  point 

Of  how  a  frail  philosopher  went  mad 

For  loneliness  of  too  strange  thinking ;  fell 

Sane  again  of  a  sudden  — 

Ha !  not  leave 
Me  here  alone  with  these  who  hold  me  here ! 


140 


A  CANDIDATE   FOR  COMMITTAL 

Never  alone,  friend  !   I  Ml  be  with  you  still !  — 
Ha  !  he  is  gone  ?   And  I  'm  not  there  to  tell 
The  court  how  sane  I  am  ? 

Men :  am  I  mad  ? 


141 


THE  CONVALESCENT 

LO  !  't  is  the  earliest  glimmering  of  dawn  !  — 

I  wake ;  and  grow,  even  with  the  growing  day.  — 

The  names  of  flowers  told  unceasingly 

In  fragrant,  fresh  reiterance  ;  the  green, 

Cool  and  delicious  energies  of  earth 

One  by  one  conjured  up  and  one  by  one 

Brooded,  made  vivid  and  adored.    Nay,  first 

Ere  these,  the  names  of  all  earth's  atmosphere's 

Mighty  emotions  ;  thunders,  clouds,  the  winds 

Out  of  the  east,  north,  west  and  south  ;  all  aspects 

Of  sun  and  storm,  earth's  weathering.  The  mountains 

And  ocean-depths,  earth's  multiplicities 

Are  told.  — And  with  the  telling,  tone  by  tone, 

Comes  health  back ;  finds  the  soul  a  sympathy 

Of  insight  and  a  strengthening  by  strength 

Of  the  primal  health  and  lustihood  of  earth. 

Ay,  and  as  strength  in  the  contemplating 

Springs  gradual,  grows  a  sympathy  again 

For  reptile,  bird  and  brute  in  heartiness 

142 


THE  CONVALESCENT 

Each  living  out  the  loftier  life  than  earth's, 
Grasp'd  by  the  soul  at  each  ascent,  each  pulse 
Of  the  life-renascence.   And  to  childhood  last 
Its  innocent,  fair,  fresh  humanity 
Grows  the  expanding  insight ;  and  I  dream 
Of  all  ingenuous  childnesses,  all  young, 
Whole-hearted,  white  expectancies.   And  shall 
Doubtless  anew  learn  sympathy  with  men 
And  women,  learn  responsibility 
Now  long  precluded  ?  —  Softly  :  't  is  not  yet. 
I  have  been  shut  from  mixture  with  my  world. 
I  have  been  very  low  'twixt  life  and  death. 
I  learn  life  slowly ;  must  learn  thoroughly 
The  lowlier  and  the  lost  ere,  once  again, 
Maturity  and  whole  humanity  — 
Achieved  at  last  as  never  felt  before  ! 
For  a  fine  fancy  fills  me  how  such  lost 
And  lowlier  life-aspects  teach  and  show, 
In  manner  to  the  need  most  suitable, 
The  loftier  energy  :  how  life  and  health 
Now  learn  to  absorb,  evalue  for  the  first  time 
A  wealth,  a  richness  hitherto  ignored ; 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Transcend  indeed  by  vividly  realizing 
Each  item  long  since  relegate,  nigh-scorn'd, 
Out  of  life  :  life  then  emptiest,  lacking  quite 
Childness  and  animal  insistency, 
Plant-passion,  ambience  of  atmosphere. 

Thus,  for  the  nonce  while  here  ensconced  I  lie 
'Mid  glimmering  walls,  to  learn  and  never  lose 
Health's  wild-world  richness;  nor  let  slip  the  chanc 
(Ere  health's  responsibilities  obscure) 
To  broaden  out  with  daylight's  pyramid 
Earth-based,  not  apex-balanced.   Sooth,  the  plant 
Seems  explicable  (to  this  twilight  mood 
At  least  of  half -health)  but  by  lust  of  earth 
And  lift  of  atmosphere,  by  sun  and  rain ; 
A  focusship  and  spherehood  known  and  felt 
Best  in  the  primal  postulate  of  loam. 
Sure,  and  the  sun  and  storm,  the  lust  and  lift 
Were  known  and  comprehended  mainly  by 
Some  lowlier,  weaklier  lust  and  lift  supposed, 
Assumed  subservient ;  geogonic  births 
Themselves  unmediable,  taken  on  trust ! 


144 


THE  CONVALESCENT 

Yes,  and  what  symbol  of  an  atmosphere, 

Of  element-emotion,  each  the  least 

Or  greatest  of  soul's  vegetations  !  Lo  ! 

Naked,  up-piercing  shafts  that  mean  the  sun 

'Mid  thicket-strugglers  ;  or  the  verdure-clothed, 

Squat  staff  which,  basking  unimpeded,  means 

The  sun  too :  each,  a  consciousness  of  need 

For  sunshine  in  a  various  phase  and  place. 

And  rain  ?  Intended  by  each  succulent  cell 

Of  close-oozed  tissue  ;  whether  netted  wide 

'Twixt  strong,  rib-trussing  veins,  else  laid  along 

Bladewise  ;  sluice-succulent  through  every  shape, 

Sensible,  sympathied  of  sun  and  rain  ; 

Mingling  and  melting  updrawn  energies 

Of  loam  with  immanence  of  atmosphere  — 

A  vegetative  physiology 

Indeed  by  adaptation,  unioning 

Of  elemental  chemistries  —  so  known, 

So  felt  and  so  made  flesh  of  the  flesh  of  me, 

Parcel,  participation  in  mine  health, 

Basal  of  pyramid  as  ne'er  before  — 

By  convalescence,  growth  in  health  along 

145 


EARLIER   POEMS 

With  earth's  less-growths;  from  stage  to  stage,  mine 

earth ! 

And  for  the  intermediate  animal, 
The  self-adaptive  not  alone  to  sun 
And  rain,  to  loam  and  atmosphere,  but  yet 
To  vegetation-immanence  as  well, 
To  growth  of  the  succulent  stem  and  spreading  branch 
Transcended  as  by  an  internality 
More  mark'd,  an  elemental  structure  less 
Unmediate  —  an  inherence  none  the  less 
Still  elemental  as  still  vegetative ; 
The  animal-intense  so  understood 
By  synthesis  of  element-through-plant, 
Of  plant-through-element  inversively : 
Made  animate  by  the  reconciling.   Thus 
My  health  grows,  shall  be  builded  bit  by  bit 
Of  the  intermediate  richness,  tier  by  tier 
Crowning  the  undergrowth  and  proven  mine 
But  by  the  structural  basing  solidly, 
The  convalescence  with  the  untamed-intense 
So  gain'd  and  grasp'd  for  explanation  of 
The  old,  lost  childnesses  —  of  childness  reach'd 

146 


THE   CONVALESCENT 

By  reapproach,  by  growth  up  from  beneath 

Gradual,  so  appreciative,  real. 

Yes,  at  a  stroke,  one  fire  of  fever,  fell 

The  towering  of  mine  emptiness,  my  spirit 

Struck  down  beneath  even  those  earth-elements 

Unseen  before  for  substantive,  essential 

To  any  soul,  true  union  through  a  world  !  — 

Struck  down  if  for  this  saving  benefit 

Of  gradual  recuperation  —  now 

An  element,  now  planthood,  now  crude  brute; 

And  now,  contemplative,  the  undismay'd 

Expectancy  of  childness,  richliest  fill'd 

Just  by  the  convalescence  ;  stoutliest  based 

In  the  learning  (point  by  point  of  soul's  past  peril) 

Of  the  deathward-tottering  in  vacancy  ; 

A  tottering  now  impossible  for  nerves 

Tension'd  and  strenuous,  no  doubt,  yet  whole 

By  conscious  earth-inclusion,  by  the  feel 

Of  less-things  reconciled,  vicariously 

Aye  to  be  cared  for. 

Shall  the  workless  child, 
Contemplative,  the  mere  analysis 

147 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Or  synthesis,  the  science  sheerly,  stay 

My  soul  from  full  recuperation,  strong 

In  ripe  capitulating,  strength  by  strength, 

Of  man's  own  world-responsibilities  ? 

No ;  no.   The  apex  of  the  pile  o'er-peers, 

Caps  and  concludes  the  geometric  mass 

Of  all ;  is  by  its  height  not  peak  alone 

But  pyramid  made  perfect  in  the  peak, 

Made  pyramid  of  tier  and  tier  best  by 

The  consummation,  most  self-realizing 

By  ultimate  angulation  of  the  height 

For  height's  sake,  therefore  for  the  pile  beneath, 

Were  element  but  nebulosity  ? 

Were  plant  but  heterogeneities 

Of  sun  and  rain,  of  loam  and  atmosphere 

Or  any  sum,  agglomerance  of  these  ? 

Were  the  live  beast  a  mere  collective  coil 

Of  vegetative  functions  cellularly 

Carcass-like,  irrespective  of  the  brute-zeal 

Different  in  kind,  in  quality  from  plant 

As  plant  from  loam  —  distinction  absolute, 

If  but  by  the  relativity  involved  ? 

148 


THE  CONVALESCENT 

Were  child  quite  explicable  (nay,  defined 

In  truth),  were  I,  this  sicklihood,  made  plain 

To  health,  as  some  amalgamative  group 

(Whence,  then,  the  novelty,  the  need  for  proof  ?) 

Of  animal  physiologies  ?  Were  man 

Of  world-responsibility  but  childness 

With  childness  iterated  till  mere  stress 

Of  multiple  childnesses  exhaust  his  soul  ? 

And  though  child,  brute,  plant,  earth  were  each  in  sort 

Responsible,  total ;  yet  for  the  full  man 

(As  for  the  child,  brute,  plant  toward  less-things  each) 

Remains  the  child's,  brute's,  plant's  inadequacy  — 

A  problem  —  by  their  difference  in  kind. 

No  synthesis  of  merely  elements 

Were  plant,  no  synthesis  of  brutes  were  child  ; 

Nor  shall  mere  synthesis  of  childhoods  grow 

(Mere  duplications  of  this  flaccid  pulse) 

My  manhood  and  responsibility, 

My  self-initiative,  vital  blood  ! 

The  synthesis  is  more  than  synthesis, 

An  integration  over  and  beyond  ; 

A  qualification :  as  analysis 

149 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Deintegrates,  annihilates  beside.  — 

No  sentience  solely,  but  an  actual  zeal, 

Passion  of  overunion,  consciousness 

Of  mutual  meaning  in  the  childness  now 

Of  contemplation  !  And  my  soul  at  last 

Shall  realize,  appreciate  best  by 

Synthetic  cosmos-creativities 

This  patient  mediation  ;  working  best 

In  and  through  past  and  lost,  planthood  and  child 

By  being  best  actively  the  strenuous  man 

Of  analytic-sympathy,  none  less 

High  self-assertion,  self-transforming  all !  — 

Though  for  the  nonce  (because  breath  flutteringly 
Warns  moderation  and  the  lean  hands  clutch 
Nerveless  the  light,  and  sudden  sinkings  qualm 
The  flush'd  frame)  first  learn  patiently  the  lesser 
And  lowlier,  lay  the  tier-on-tier  whereby 
Alone  were  apex,  apex ;  health,  I  ween, 
World-worthy  !  Be  the  name  of  element, 
Of  wind,  sun,  rain  and  atmosphere,  the  title 
Of  planthoods  told  unceasingly ;  that  strength 

150 


THE   CONVALESCENT 

(Slowlier  than  morning  on  my  four  wan  walls) 
Grow  gradual,  strength  by  strength,  up  through  ;  ab 
sorb, 

Resolve  by  sympathy  a  nascent  soul !  — 
Wherefore  anew  the  brooding  ;  vividly 
The  adoration  convalescentwise. 


THE  BLOCKADER 

SHADOWS  of  sea-birds  circling ;  swift-swept  clouds 
Whitely  sun-steep'd  ;  flash  of  the  showering  wave 
Aquiver  and  wonderful  for  emerald  depth ; 
Swish  of  the  spray,  soft,  ice-like,  keen  as  steel ; 
And  over  all,  through  all,  the  streaming,  strong, 
Salt  wind,  broad-blowing,  vigorous  with  light, 
Warm  with  the  warmth  of  ocean,  sun  and  sky, 
Day  after  day  out  of  the  east  and  o'er 
And  on  and  never  ceasing.   And  the  ship, 
Sole  sentinel  upon  the  weltering  sea, 
Heaving  and  settling,  slow,  majestical 
To  lift  and  fall  of  each  next,  ponderous  surge  — 
Surges  o'er-beetling,  concaved  ;  one  and  one 
Upbrimming  huge  beneath  us,  till  compress'd, 
Tense-smooth 'd  with  foam  thwart-lapsing  to  the  trough, 
Passes  the  power  and  onward,  aft  and  aft, 
One  beyond  one  relapses  distantly 
Convex,  elastic,  liquid-turbulent, 
Aleap  for  riddance  of  the  weighty  bulk, 
Westward  adown  the  gulf.  And  day  by  day 

152 


THE   BLOCKADER 

Sun,  from  the  east  burning  above  us,  orbs 

Archwise  to  westward  ;  while,  between,  the  clouds 

Swing  hurrying  shadows.    Night  by  night  the  stars 

Multiple,  or  the  heaven-hung,  mild  moon 

Through  phase  and  phase,  ever  from  east  to  west 

Lift,  tower  and  fall  again  :  beneath,  above, 

One  weltering  and  one  processioning 

Unendingly.   And,  amidst  all,  the  ship 

Sentinel,  steadily  lifting,  falling ;  swamp'd 

In  the  trough,  upthrust  to  the  crown;  wash'd,  deluged, 

drown'd 

To  rear  again  with  bows  a  cataract 
Of  torrent  riddance,  spume  arinse  in  spouts 
From  scuppers,  hawse-pipes ;  daylong  blister'd,  burn'd 
By  fire  above ;  nightlong  beneath  the  bland 
Star-sparks  assuaged  or  emberlike  by  moon 
In  soothness  saturated  —  aye  the  same : 
By  pride-perversity  unyieldingly, 
A  sentinel  at  stand  in  the  shallow  seas  !  — 
And  I  too,  sentinel  on  steaming  decks, 
Stand  spray'd  and  spumed  upon ;   burn'd  black,  or 

blanch'd 


153 


EARLIER   POEMS 

In  splendor  of  the  night ;  blown  warm  or  chill ; 

Shadow 'd  by  cloud  ;  bescream'd  by  the  swirling  gull, 

Circled  by  laboring  pelican,  by  flock 

Of  swift  shearwaters ;  whisper'd  by  the  swish 

Of  the  foam,  by  whistling  of  the  silvery  flash 

CalPd  fish  :  stand  I  at  solemn  lift  and  fall 

By  pride-perversity  unyieldingly 

Ceaseless  awatch  over  the  shallow  seas. 

And  by  much  watching,  much  contemplating 

Of  sun  and  sea  and  sky,  with  respite  from 

Conflict  at  quarters  to  keep  brawn  and  brain 

Keen  for  destruction  and  the  cursed  assault, 

Widens  the  soul,  to  heed  this  stream  of  the  wind, 

Sense  wash  of  the  wave  and  orbit  of  the  sky ; 

Take  permeation  by  sun,  air  and  sea 

Their  onwardness ;  and  onwardness  with  theirs ; 

Take  disavowal  of  persistent  stand 

And  pride-perversity  unyieldingly : 

Impatient,  as  with  sea  and  sky  and  air, 

Petulant  of  impertinent  blockade. 

I  am  mid-aged ;  the  liberality, 

154 


THE  BLOCKADER 

Launch 'd  late.   From  earliest  youth  conservatism 

Of  obsolete,  stiff-bluff' d  barbarity 

Call'd  bravery  and  martially  esteem'd, 

Has  been  mine ;  in  oblivion  of  the  blood's 

Insistent  pulse,  has  cold  obedience 

To  worn,  old  ways  of  masterful,  hard  men 

Been  mine  —  train'd  strait  in  tactics  of  the  schools 

To  do  out  duty,  whosesoe'er  the  soul 

(Though  haply  pinch'd  and  sordid,  mean  and  cramp'd, 

Yet  ranking  by  commission  beyond  mine) 

Assumes  superiority  for  source 

Of  absolution  as  for  dominance. 

I  'd  be  too  strict,  too  much  this  ship's  machine, 

Too  sage,  perhaps,  with  awe  traditional 

Tempering  the  heart,  blood-reverence  for  law, 

Authority  and  hierarchy  here 

For  recusance  :  so  by  the  base  default 

From  oath,  from  loyalty  of  personal  pledge, 

To  bring  disgrace,  their  yard-arm  disrepute 

On  the  young  emancipation  !   Yet  the  new 

Intelligence  absolves  from  ordinance 

Of  any  aged,  sea  worthless  shrift  this  soul 

155 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Staunch  to  weigh  well  the  due  of  years  to-come 

Toward  adequate  self-consistency.    I  stand 

Officer  of  the  deck,  drill -martinet 

Of  the  schools,  train'd  product  of  the  rule  precise 

Unflinching  and  immitigable  :  man 

Made  sheer  machine  (an  the  code's  imperative 

Suffice  to  blot,  obliterate  a  soul  ? ) ; 

Sentinel  of  a  system,  genus-type 

And  sign  of  mundane  pride-perversity; 

And  must  stand  till  some  chance,  spent  shot  dis-jar 

The  pinion,  stanchion,  whatnot  which  I  am, 

To  rust  and  rest  in  the  deep  —  while  clanks  and  thumps 

A  sound  steel  in  the  socket ;  and  the  ship 

Still  throbs  a  bloodless,  sense-obliterate, 

Dull  grinding  as  the  system  still  must  front 

World's  onwardness,  keep  bows  (meant  to  push  o'er, 

Swift  with  the  wind  and  wave ! )  breast-on  to  the  surge. 

But,  for  the  instant  need,  be  soul's  relief, 

Respite  in  freedom  of  conceived  revolt !  — 

I  am  aware  this  figure  of  my  speech 

Is  insufficient,  pitifully  prone 

To  misconstruction  if  the  adequate  whole 

156 


THE   BLOCKADER 

Be  based  on  such  projection.   Heaven  and  earth 

In  any  onwardness  which  is  their  own 

(Our  physics  teaches)  are  at  worst  a  loss, 

At  best  a  nigh-reiterant  energy, 

If  progressive,  ay,  even  as  regressive, 

Less  adequately  than  man's  mood  demands 

Or  man  exhibits ;  civilization's  swing 

And  sweep  by  far  outstripping  sun  or  sky, 

Salt  wind  or  ocean  in  their  stale  intent 

Ail-too  primordial,  effete  far  worse 

Than  any  slavishness  of  humankind  : 

Molecules,  whose  world-adequacy  mark'd 

Archaic  eons  of  cosmogeny; 

Which,  since  first,  palaeozoic  protoplasm, 

Have  slunk  ashamed  (I  credit  them  with  shame 

Too  generously  ? )  save  as  evolving  fresh 

In  each  fresh,  plasmic  cell-stuff  not  themselves. 

Yet  is  there  somewhat  splendid  to  the  sense 

In  sweep  of  the  sphere  'twixt  sea's  horizon-round 

And  sea's  horizon-round,  procession'd  swarm 

Sufficient  for  man's  metaphor  to  fuse 

Mine  with  the  life  which,  ne'er  so  slave,  at  soul 


157 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Still  liberally  moves  and  onwardly 

(If  poised  in  orbit,  yet  criterial  thus) 

As  such  may,  marvellously  moulds  each  old 

In  new  ascendency  unwearyingly  — 

Petulant  of  impertinent  blockade. 

And  man,  who  knowing  onwardness  yet  waits 

Wanton  in  sloth,  is  by  the  conscienced  shame 

Thus  much  the  less  akin  to  sky  and  sea. 

Wherefore  in  sight  of  sky  and  sea  I  stand 

For  obsolescence  and  a  worn-out  way ; 

For  abnegator,  unresponsible, 

Absolved  from  conscience  ;  and  yet  none  the  less 

Knowing  the  lordlier  conquering  that  comes 

By  soul-inclusion  and  the  lifting-on, 

Not  by  the  crushing-back.   This  wide  insight, 

This  permeation  through  sun,  sea  and  sky, 

Lifts  it  not  these  in  me  by  metaphor 

To  mighty  onwardness  inspiring  all, 

Beyond  mere  molecules'  redundant  drift 

Of  stale,  primordial,  atomic  dearth  ? 

Stand  I  not  here  and  now  (a  mere  machine, 

A  martinet  degenerate  by  test 


THE   BLOCKADER 

Of  modern  liberation)  yet  by  strength 
Of  confluence  a  soul,  a  spirit  anew, 
A  liberation  of  an  universe  ? — 
I  free  my  soul-speech  even  from  the  cant 
Of  watch-word,  technic  of  the  dismal  drill, 
Cult  of  authority  that,  absolute 
But  by  inconsequence  and  ignorance, 
Now  melts  from  mind  as  yonder  drench  of  spume, 
Sea's  obsolete,  old  inefficiency 
(Which  served,  maybe,  to  heed  me  of  my  soul) 
Drips  from  the  breast  of  the  ship  I  fain  would  shake 
Aloft  for  men  to  marvel  at,  a  new 
Signal  of  self-responsibility  — 
Ensign  of  absolute  deliverance  ! 
Yon  admiral  should  startle  from  his  sleep 
Of  savage  dreams ;  and  in  the  desperate, 
Sublime  refusal  sense  this  soul  at  last 
Of  the  world  and  world  's  repugnance  of  command 
Not  based  on  a  world-whole  conscience:  and  man's 
best!— 

Man's  best!  Can  mutiny  be  meant  by  that? 

159 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Can  world-whole  conscience  countenance  a  lie, 

Countermand  mandates  if  but  primitive, 

Yet  preacknowledged  to  allegiance  sworn  ? 

Desertion  ? —   Nay  !  the  duty  first  self-imposed 

In  voluntary  self-abandonment, 

Were  prime  of  obligations  as  of  rights  ! 

If  that  the  shackles  thwart  the  truth  at  growth 

(If  I  be  wiselier  I  than  formerly 

And  irk'd  by  dead-hand  of  the  self  that  was), 

Yet  law  is  Soul  for  souls  self-bound  thereby 

(And  I  continuously  self  the  same, 

Accountable  to  every  earlier  oath  !). 

And  orders  and  authorities  have  place 

For  him,  yon  admiral,  for  these  my  crew 

(He  over  me  as  I  am  over  them) 

Incapable,  either,  of  self-governance  else  ! 

Nor  mine  the  self-governance  save  soul  include, 

Contemplate,  so  subordinate,  their  zeal 

For  the  wrong  way  of  the  world ;  and  work  through 

them 

Not  self-disgraced,  but  by  a  sage  respect 
For  pledge  and  patience  of  the  personal  vow 

160 


THE   BLOCKADER 

In  the  sight  of  all ;  by  consequence  of  soul 
True  to  the  old,  worn  ways  made  obsolete 
But  wonderfully  luring  on,  in  law 
Of  absolution  by  the  self-command  — 
Man  out  of  molecule  but  by  molecule  still 
At  self-evolvement !  — 

Sail  ?    A  sail  ?    Escaped 

The  slipperier  while  I  'd  speculate  :  blind,  blind 
Through  conscience'  utmost  clarity  ?  — 

"Give  chase! 
Solid  shot !  "   Ho  !   She  shall  not  break  blockade ! 


161 


THE  PATROL 

HUGE,  phosphor-gleaming  surges  'gainst  the  dim, 

Wind-scurrying  sands  burst  mountainous  from  out 

Yon  tumult,  from  yon  blackening  confront, 

Out-tower  and  overpeer ;  to  crash  in  ruin 

With  roar  above  the  roaring  of  the  gale 

Froth 'd  on  the  spume-slant:  an  insatiate,  vast, 

Unsealike  vagueness  and  a  chaos  made 

Of  unbeginning,  unreturning  waste 

Where  once  was  water.   And  o'erhead  the  clouds 

Low,  swift  as  swept  smoke,  dun  and  dusk  rack  on 

Coast-long  :  a  merging  of  beach  both  and  surge 

To  nought.   And,  dank  beneath  the  dunes,  bleak  lands, 

Bog-like  and  naked  of  all  trees,  shake,  shiver 

In  flat-blown  sheet  of  sedge-blades,  lowering,  hoar 

As  each  gust  greater  than  the  last  lays  low 

Their  crush 'd  and  cowering  stem-cells.  And,  save  sedge 

So  shrouded  this  land's  nakedness,  were  earth 

Engulf  d,  long  since  blown  wide,  else  swallow'd  by 

These  surf-gulps.   And  this  desolation  seems 

A  terrible  and  tragic  reckoning, 

162 


THE  PATROL 

Quintessence  and  a  focuss'd  figurehood 

Of  world's  stark  orphanage  :  how  only  cloud 

Insensible  and  gale  unmeaning,  by 

Effort  to  wipe  out  land  or  sea  alike 

To  indiscernibility,  are  given 

For  reconciling's  stead  ;  and  mockingly 

(For  union  of  a  living  sea  and  land) 

In  irony  bewilder  this  wild  beach 

With  sifting  aye  and  sifting,  bolting  o'er 

Unalterably  all  these  myriad  sands 

Sans  place  or  order.   I  alone  of  the  night 

Seem  life,  seem  order-borne :  yet  mockingly 

Lost  in  mine  effort  to  be  guardian 

Of  sea  or  land ;  seem  utterly  like  gale 

Or  surge  or  cloud-rack  or  these  withering  blades, 

An  irony  and  chaos.   I,  like  light 

Before  the  world-creation,  am  nor  man 

Nor  earth  nor  waters  which  be  over  earth 

Nor  beneath  earth  :  the  demarcation  stopp'd 

And  world  run  backward  till  before  the  light 

Came  or  the  waters  were  beneath,  above, 

Here,  yon  nor  anywhere.   And  I,  alone, 

163 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Unaided  fall  to  chaos  and  am  spent 

By  soul's  exhaustion.    Here  on  the  sands  I  sink 

But  to  be  buried,  sifted  ten  times  o'er 

With  scurrying  silt-storms ;  and  am  miserably 

Perishing  for  this  orphanage,  this  world 

Orderless,  godless,  uncreated,  nought ; 

The  iteration  and  reiterance 

Ended  —  no  way,  no  cyclic  forth-and-turn 

Of  sane  patrol ;  but  one  insanity 

Of  unreturning,  wherefore  unadvanced, 

Stiff  stationship :  patrol's  obliteration.  — 

What  were  this  order,  God,  creation  ?  Whence 

Its  nothingness  proved  of  the  night  and  rack  ? 

Here  in  the  chill  exhaustion  someway  life 

Shows  novel  —  as  the  pulse-beats  weaken,  leaps 

A  fresh  interpretation  !  All  is  lost : 

World  ended.    Build  I  in  the  death  anew 

A  world ;  create,  order  and  aye  uphold 

A  true  patrolship ;  am  first  realizing 

An  absolute  guardship  which  itself  shall  prove 

Sea,  strand  or  land,  cloud  or  the  gale,  one  truth 

Of  genuine  inexhaustion  ;  self-support 

164 


THE   PATROL 

Unending,  infinite-cycled ;  even  by  being 
Returnless,  unbeginning  !  —  Lo  !  I  lie 
Drooping  to  death ;  soaring  to  light  alive ! 

This  orphanage,  this  chaos  and  this  stop 
Supposed,  by  no  beginning  and  no  God  ! 
'T  is  proven.   And  this  gale  is  all  that  was 
From  first ;  no  first  else  ;  nay,  no  first  defined. 
This  is  the  worldhood  :  chaos,  nothingness 
In  all  times  terminant,  an  unremittent, 
Inexorable,  absolute  blockade 
To  any  journeying  ;  the  mere  machine 
Proved  mere  machine,  hence  utterly  run-down. 
E'en  though  the  day  to-come  may  constantly 
Succeed  night ;  sunshine  and  the  fecund  spread 
Of  earth  confronting  ocean's  moisture-breath 
For  marriage-procreation  be  the  bourne 
Of  every  storm-rack ;  though  creation  come 
To  severate  the  waters  constantly  ; 
Yet  is  the  demarcation  now  wiped  out. 
This  moment  no  polarity  of  earth 
To  ocean  and  no  unioning  of  light 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Are  mine.   But  instantly  is  God  deposed  — 

Creation,  order,  law  defunctionate 

To  orphanage.   And  I,  incapable 

Of  guardianship,  am  no  man  ;  never  was 

Nor  could  be  creature  of  an  order'd  scheme, 

Patrol  of  this  lost  boundary ;  but  am  not ; 

Even  as  this  emptiness  I  deem'd  an  use 

Of  ocean-sperm  and  land-fertility 

Swoons  storm-obliterate.  —  The  chaos  swarms ; 

The  rack  sweeps  on  and  over  nothingness !  — 

Though  is  the  vast  suggestion  mystic-borne 

In  on  the  swooning  spirit;  how,  in  last 

Extremity,  most  isolate  unuse 

And  worth lessness  of  creature  that  I  was 

(Sunk  then  in  sand-storms,  shrivelling  away 

To  spume-shrunk  indiscernibility 

World-like),  how  yet  this  deadweight  which  I  am 

Sums  up  and  comprehends  as  ne'er  before 

This  tragedy,  this  elemental  loss 

Now  first  perceived,  now  known  a  tragedy ; 

Whence  personally  vital,  valuable 

And  genuine  as  can  be  no  creation, 

166 


THE   PATROL 

No  order'd  iterance  :  self-processive  ;  ay, 

Appreciates,  realizes  in  this  doom 

Of  earth,  air,  ocean  and  the  nought  of  things 

Someway  a  worldhood,  a  sufficiency 

Of  self-assumption  —  were  it  earth's,  air's,  ocean's  ? 

An  ordering,  creation,  nay,  an  end  ? 

Or,  in  default  of  each  and  all  of  these 

(These  unit-portions  of  the  spent  machine 

Proved  zero ;  every  unit  yielding  place 

To  a  total,  infmitesimally  whole, 

Self-individual  uniqueness),  rather 

A  somewhat  in  whose  desolation  felt 

Of  self  (self-conscienced  emptiness)  is  found 

No  use,  indeed,  nor  order,  no  patrol 

Of  forth-and-turn  and  turn-again  ;  but  value 

Of  estimation,  poise  and  focusship 

Ensphering,  self-use  —  beauty  —  which  can  need 

No  purpose  and  no  sanction,  yet  nor  God 

Beyond  the  autovital,  through  and  through 

Uniquely  self -establish 'd ;  each  in  pause 

Eternal  but  by  being  incessantly, 

Interminably  fluxion'd  ? — Can  the  strength 

167 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Of  this  corporeal  tragedy  rear  up 

My  bodily  presence  over  and  beyond 

This  battling,  baffling  of  the  terrible  gale 

To  re-exertion  in  self-exercise 

Of  adequate  inexhaustion,  making  way 

Where  no  way  was  :  ah  !  guardian  utterly 

Of  overwhelming  tempest  ?    Through  this  storm 

I  stretch  abroad,  brooding  as  light  before 

Creation.   And  am  chaos,  rack ;  am  world  ! 

This,  then,  is  godship ;  this,  the  cause,  supposed 

Abandon'd  ;  this,  the  guardianship,  patrol 

Of  earth  and  ocean  —  on  this  swept  sand-beach 

To  swoon  !    Thus  in  the  estimated  loss, 

The  conscious  sacrifice  extinguishing 

The  bodily  progress  and  the  finite  zeal, 

Springs  space-transcendence !    In  the  storm  first  find 

Ocean  and  earth  the  ocean-difference 

From  earth  by  self-abandonment  of  all 

Distinctive  feature  !    And  the  paradox 

Makes  of  my  burial,  my  perishing, 

A  perseverance.  Can  this  strange  truth  be  ?  — 

168 


THE   PATROL 

Someway  these  limbs  bestir.   A  tingling  steals 
Through  flesh  and   marrow;  that  the   beat  of 

brain 

Pulses  the  blood  at  heart ;  that  now  I  lift 
Body  erect  and  stand  upon  these  feet 
For  forward  progress  :  thus ;  and  thus.   I  move ; 
Resume  patrolship.   And  yon  eastward  rift 
Augurs  a  storm-subsidence  and  the  dawn  ! 
Lo  !  was  the  truth  but  paradox ;  my  dream 
A  quietism  :  how  that  the  world  might  run 
Back  from  accomplishment;  assuredly 
That  pause  could  be  of  any  purposive 
Use  and  advancement,  maintenance  or  end  ? 
Have  I  been  drunk  with  derogation  from 
Ripe  humanhood,  become  as  untaught  babe 
In  birth-approximation  of  this  numb 
Death-swooning?    And  am  now  by  blood's  revolt 
Revitalized,  re-masking  at  this  dawn's 
Storm-respite  to  soul-husks  not  quite  slough 'd-off 
Of  orderly  patrol,  the  turn-again 
Aye  and  return  through  number'd,  finite  shifts 
Of  the  demarcation  of  a  land  from  sea, 

169 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Maintenance  of  a  severance,  a  beach 

Created  ;  to  God's  worn  creatorship, 

Establishment  as  of  mechanic  world 

And  man,  each  insufficient  to  maintain 

Self  or  the  other,  save  if  by  recourse 

To  authority  and  preestablish'd  scheme 

Inexplicable,  being  ex  macUna  ? 

Can  soul  forswear  soul's  death-experience  ; 

Born  again  (nay,  now  first  well-born !)  be  still 

Unautogenerate,  unsophisticate 

Creature  of  order  and  a  selfless  God 

Supposed  :  but  in  that  agony  supreme 

Outlived,  drown'd  down  —  not  rehabilitate ? 

Sooth,  'twas  a  supreme  sanity,  insane 

(Here  I  take  up  obliterated  lines 

With  firmness  fresh  of  foot  and  strength  of  limb) 

By  stress  of  concentration  :  world  and  God 

Focuss'd  so  microcosmic  as  to  seem 

Nought  but  my  bodily  swooning ;  now  recharged 

With  wide  vitality ;  none  less  ensphered 

By  mine  expansive,  unimprison'd  soul  — 

God  and  the  world  a  godship  and  a  world 

170 


THE  PATROL 

Made  over  new  (these  footmarks  on  the  sand 
Are  a  new  path  cut  out,  untrod  before 
And  unretractable  —  mine,  yet  these  sands' 
Which  hitherto  were  sands',  not  mine  ;  which  in 
That  swooning  were  made  mine,  not  then  these 

sands'!) 

And  I  a  cosmic  soul,  a  spirit  of  earth, 
Air,  ocean  and  this  ocean-beach  :  as  these 
Are  soul  too ;  each,  some  focus  of  me  here 
In  comprehension  :  world-in-me,  the  God  !  — 

Lo !  dawn  ;  whose  orderly  returning  streams 

No  iteration  of  created  light 

Spawn'd  upon  chaos ;  but  whose  after-storm 

Is  a  re-birth  of  this  my  tempest  and 

This  self-same  tempest  of  earth,  sky  and  sea ; 

Divine  and  needing  no  establishment ; 

Unique  ;  unknown  before  ;  criterion 

Of  all-time  ;  by  world's  very  orphanage 

A  self-sustainment,  ordering  afresh 

The  demarcations  ;  morning's  after-night ! 

Lo!  how  the  tempest  calms  itself;  sea,  sky 

171 


EARLIER  POEMS 

And  land  acquire,  now  first,  distinctivewise 
Their  intercourse,  their  organism.   My  spirit 
Guardeth  a  worldhood  ;  ceaseless,  unbegun 
And  unreturning  proveth  aye  patrol ! 


172 


A  DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY 

RESERVING  my  best  answer  till  the  end :  — 

Friend,  I  am  glad  of  opportunity 

(Returning  thanks  for  gratulation  given) 

Now  on  attainment  of  my  good  degree 

To  offer  explanation  womanwise 

Of  woman's  aim ;  how,  modern  yet  madonna, 

We  nowise  for  the  man's-acquirement 

Doff  femininity ;  but  far  the  more 

Attain  the  real,  ideal  womanhood. 

For  justification  seems  essential  here 

(If  not  in  your  eyes,  yet  required  of  mine) 

Of  me  who  undertake,  more  ways  than  one, 

To  be  the  equal  helpmate  of  a  man. 

And,  in  so  setting  forth  apology 

For  manlier  womanhood,  I  gladly  greet 

Manhood  that  learns  to  read  doubly  aright, 

Can  comprehend  the  womanly  in  man. — 

This,  in  appreciation  of  that  work 

Of  ethic  grace,  more  woman's  gift  than  man's, 

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EARLIER  POEMS 

Which  my  philosophy  so  well  approves, 

My  womanhood  shall  aid  you  carry  on. — 

Modern  :  madonna  ?    Can  the  sweet,  old  faith 

In  innocence,  in  household  holiness 

Abide  sophistication  of  our  times? 

Woman,  the  wise,  be  woman  any  more? 

Can  girlhood — 'grace,  the  glad  simplicity 

Of  young,  ingenuous  heavenliness ' — survive 

Strict  application  of  equality 

With  standards  of  a  strenuous  competition, 

World's  sweat-and-blood  contention  man  with  man? 

Ay ;  and  in  thus  surviving  best  transfuse 

The  mundane  manhood,  make  world's  wealth  and  health 

Heavenly-feminine,  an  whole  humane!  — 

First,  for  the  trivial  accessories 
Of  garb  and  guise  of  speech,  I  would  not  urge 
Man-modes  or  manners.   By  some  hours  of  contact 
With  maids  too  mannish  in  their  cloth  and  cut 
Of  talk,  I  reach  conclusion  that  such  scouts 
Sent  in  reconnaissance  advanced  of  the  guard 
Are  simply  spies  to  bring  back  tales  of  the  camp 


174 


A  DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY 

Its  orientation,  outlook,  walls,  redoubts 

Merely,  not  privy  to  the  commander's  mind 

Of  either  side,  not  serviced  of  the  staff 

Fit  to  interpret  information  filch 'd. 

These  are  the  sexless  who — scarce  maid,  scarce 

Lose  lovability  of  femininehood 

Nor  gain  the  compensation  of  man-insight 

Into  proportions,  dignities  of  things. 

Them  I  pass  over ;  though  admit  the  garb 

Man-modish  of  presumptive  usefulness 

When,  yielding  to  demands  of  deftness,  maids 

May  yet  not  cast  aside  maid-modesty 

By  too  conspicuous  precociousness  — 

In  time,  when  men's  own  minds  learn  to  combine 

Propriety  with  the  freedom,  not  as  now 

Through  long  association  needs  suspect 

A  laxness  with  the  unconvention'd  style. 

And  also  I  'd  admit  the  maid,  if  frank, 

Were  then  more  sure  of  speech  to  countervail 

Men's  coarseness,  want  of  courtesy ;  to  teach 

In  practising  a  sober  chivalry 

Of  man's-to-woman,  woman 's-speech-to-man 

175 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Direct,  distinct,  yet  sympathetic ;  mellow'd 

Not  by  superfluous  gallantry,  but  open 

Admission  of  a  mutual  reverence.  — 

These  things  will  with  the  culture  of  the  times 

Ripen,  the  outward  rind  of  seed  within. 

'Tis  the  intention,  quality  attain'd 

Of  spiritual  richness,  which  makes  well  or  ill 

The  maidliness  or  manliness  of  mode ; 

Interpretation  yet  dependent  on 

Environment,  mind-habit  man's  or  maid's. 

Which  leads  me  to  the  kernel  of  my  creed ; 

Necessity  that  aught  of  great  or  good, 

If  to  be  instant  good,  not  obsolete 

Nor  overwhelm'd,  must  —  howsoever  deep, 

And  all  the  more  in  virtue  best  of  depth  — 

Must  lift  at  level,  ne'er  below  the  brim, 

Of  the  flood  of  life ;  how  world-environment 

Such  as  the  times  have  labor'd  and  brought  forth 

Affords  criterion ;  and  but  well  or  ill 

(Though  well-and-ill  give  meaning  to  the  mean, 

Value-directive  to  above-below ; 

176 


A  DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY 

And  in  such  sense  were  moral-absolute !  ) 

Is  found  above,  below  respectively 

The  best  mean  of  attainment  of  the  times 

In  the  purpose  and  the  practice  pitch  'd  upon 

By  way  of  instance  :  marriage,  humanhood. 

That  which  were  well  in  man,  we  'd  both  agree, 

When  battle-ax  meant  wooing  —  the  bloodshed's 

Barbarity  —  were  barbarous  but  now 

In  the  taste  of  now ;  were  best  at  that  brute  date. 

The  maid  who  sulk'd  at  spindle  in  her  tower 

Daylong,  and  nightlong  waiPd  her  plight,  were  nought 

To  the  purpose  of  perfection  in  our  time  — 

Unless  for  a  social  gain  by  pity  given, 

A  satisfaction  that  she  wax  not  worse 

In  the  nerves  and  need  asylum  for  her  pains ! 

And  if  in  home-communion  womanhood 

Be  not,  all  ways,  full  equal  of  the  man 

(Whate'er  may  prove  a  measure  of  attainment) 

Is  woman  of  necessity  degraded 

In  the  ultimate  humanhood,  the  family. 

Ay,  and  can  family  in  wife  degraded  — 

Motherhood  proved  inadequate  to  man  — 

177 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Prosper  in  fatherhood  left  lone  and  mateless ; 
Man  find  humanity,  be  human-whole 
In  union  proved  no  partnership  humane?  — 
Thus  it  behoves  to  match  the  best  in  man 
With  woman-measure  equal,  measure  meet 
For  the  masculine  attainment  through  the  world 
(Focuss'd  and  centred  at  the  hearth  of  home ; 
Without  which,  sex  needs  here  no  argument !  ) 
In  best  and  brightest.    If  that  best  be  love 
(Without  which,  home-community  were  nought- 
As  you  nor  I  should  anywise  dispute  ! ) 
Behoves  a  close  inquiry  whether  love  — 
Nought  differing,  as  love,  in  either  sex ; 
Being  union,  if  of  infinite-diverse 
For  either,  each-in-each  identically — 
Prosper  by  much  sophistication,  candor 
Of  intellectual  determinism : 
Whether  a  logick'd  love  be  —  Poetry! 
And,  if  the  intellectually  complex 
Be  proved  to  prosper  love  in  modern  man, 
Must  woman,  to  attain  full  womanhood, 
Acquire  the  characteristic  modern  mind.  — 

178 


A  DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY 

Friend,  my  philosophy  has  taught  me  much 
(But  you  too  know  how  love's  entail'd  of  learn 
ing!) 

Beneath  the  times'  appearance.   At  the  first 
I  nursed  a  skepticism  juvenile 
Anent  cool  wooings  with  much  circumstance 
Of  pros  and  cons  and  welfare  of  the  race. 
Till,  by  some  sight  of  wisdomless,  rude  worship 
CalPd  love  —  love  once,  when  world  stood  at  les» 

strength 

Of  stress  —  yet  little  beyond  appetite 
In  carelessness  for  consequence  to  her 
Beloved  —  for  inability  to  comfort, 
Protect ;  in  lust-romantic  selfishness 
Scarce  Love  —  it  came  upon  me  that  the  more 
Of  knowledge  more  the  spiritual  intent, 
World-conscious  content  actual  of  the  union 
In  the  spirit-self  call'd  Love.   If  world  be  one 
(One  time-stream  conscious  of  before-and-after, 
With  content  ever-cumulant  both  ways), 
Then  is  that  oneness  by  diversity  — 
Obtain'd,  ne'er  by  disparity  'twixt  minds 

179 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Sex-married  but  rather,  by  a  wealth  in  each 

At  acme  of  its  own  development 

Contributive  to  the  spirit-partnership  — 

More  and  more,  more  and  more  an  unioning 

In  ripe  reality  concrete  and  true, 

Most  whole  by  most  complexity.   And  man 

Scientist,  if  but  high  philosopher 

At  heart  (philosophy,  the  world-made-self 

Of  science),  living  lover  cosmical ! 

Man  loves  not  less  by  learning  more  and  more ; 

But  more  distinctly,  more  directly  loves ; 

Unioning  in  his  love  a  world  more  rich, 

More  heaven-holy  as  more  habitable 

With  every  admonition  of  the  brain.  — 

The  old  simplicity  was  worldhood  once 

When  yet  concrete,  complex'd  as  world  then  knew ; 

Not  now.   The  innocent  inadequacy 

Precludes  proportionate  love-with-wisdom,  leaves 

Not  godliness,  not  whole  humanity. 

Nought  is  in  knowledge  of  the  wide  god- world 

To  cancel  wonder,  worship :  more  and  more 

Beauty  made  manifest  the  more  love-known  ; 

1 80 


A  DOCTOR  OF  PHILOSOPHY 

Man,  woman,  known  in  mutual  reverence.  — 

Whence,  would  I  share  the  burden  of  the  world, 

The  '  glory  and  splendor  and  beauty',  firm  in  love, 

Be  fit  for  fostering  of  men  to-come 

And  women  of  the  future  family, 

Must  we  in  family  be,  both  alike, 

(And  wisdom  means  a  culture  of  the  highest, 

A  love-enraptured  world-philosophy  !) 

Wisely  in  love  —  and  else  no  love  in  fact : 

I,  only  so,  eternal  womanhood. 

Friend,  by  this  intricate  tediousness  I  take 
A  serious  luxury  in  writing  long, 
Painstakingly  in  pure,  supreme  delight ; 
Nor  need  excuse  me  to  the  poet-lover  — 
Feeling  (scarce  song  in  a  love  less  adequate  !) 
Alone  true  poetry  in  logick'd  love.  — 
Not  that  you  want  the  argument !  Your  prayer 
Assumed  the  worth  of  the  woman  nobly  sued, 
After  these  years'  forbearance  whilst  I  toil'd, 
With  gratulation  of  her  task's  success  ! 
But— for  the  justification  of  myself, 

181 


EARLIER   POEMS 

My  woman's  way  unto  my  mind  of  a  man  ; 
My  woman's  way  which  yieldingly  says  :  *  Yes  *. 
How  should  a  woman  in  these  latter  days  — 
Madonna  but  by  a  maid-modernity  — 
Want  for  the  word  to  make  of  woman's  world 
Man's  heaven,  ope  humanity  to  both  ? 
Thus,  for  this  multitude  of  reasons  (woman 
Is  woman  more  for  reasoning  rigidly, 
Woman  indeed  worth  man  but  by  man-logic), 
I  repeat,  '  Yes  '.  With  reverence  I  deem 
Myself  shown  worthy  of  an  equal  bond 
With  man,  a  mutual-freedom.    I  declare 
Purpose  to  put  to  the  proof  my  good  degree 
As  wife  and  woman-fosterer  of  childhood 
Worthy  to  serve,  worthy  to  share  and  show 
World-self-control.   For  that  I  know  your  love 
(Knowledge  comports  with   love,  by  all  these 

proofs  !), 

I  love  you  and  will  live  with  you,  we  twain 
In  world-sophistication  made  one  soul. 
Thus  I  accept  the  gratulation  given 
At  the  gratulation's  test;  admit  attainment 

182 


A  DOCTOR  OF   PHILOSOPHY 

Formal  of  fitness  for  the  modern  life 
Of  loving  logic,  lovable  counselhood, 

Here  in  this  letter  little  is  of  new, 
But  all  sincere.    In  all  sincerity  — 


183 


A  HORTICULTURIST 

'  GOOD  growing-weather'  ?  —  Sir,  I  seldom  find 

Souls  of  a  leisure  that  delights  to  lay 

Ear  to  the  growth  of  the  ground  and  listen  life's 

Slow,  verdurous  vegetating.   Yet  my  life 

Is  lapp'd  in  leisure  of  a  listening  soul 

(Leisure  by  verdurehood  made  busiest  so) ; 

One  kind  affinity  for  flowery  facts 

Their  loves  and  likes  and  splendid  prospering 

In  the  sun  here  and  the  watering  of  the  rain. 

And,  for  the  gradus  of  the  yearly  growth 

Is  generous  and  one  annual  orbit  scarce 

Distinct  at  large  from  annual  orbits  gone 

Year  by  year,  season  after  season,  finds 

My  sympathy  much  space  to  enter  in, 

Enjoy  and  ponder-through  the  lives  of  these 

In  various,  vegetative  meanings ;  mind 

Of  mine  a  source  as  of  philosophy 

Interpreting  cell-science  of  our  times 

To  a  function'd  monadism.    And,  for  the  years 

Are  years,  is  long-establish 'd  sympathy 

184 


A   HORTICULTURIST 

Sweet;  and  mine  insight  rooted,  great  and  green. 

That  thus  I  seldom  crave  the  human  sort 

Of  sympathy ;  and,  while  accepting  yours 

For  a  genuine  godsend  of  discipleship 

Such  as  you  care  to  offer,  I  should  maintain 

Communion  nathless  satisfying,  sir, 

Here  in  the  garden  though  you  chose  to  go.  — 

Yet  go  not !  For  the  human  comradeship 

Exceeds  the  vegetative.   And  't  is  solace 

This  once  to  parley  in  equality. 

Of  my  speech,  most  must  be  to  show  you  here 

Humanity  in  plantship ;  poetry 

Of  planthood  that  is  in  me.   Though  but  the  more 

Is  speech  distinctive  over  and  beyond 

The  plantship  of  our  manhood.   And  in  your  air 

I  scent  at  any  rate  a  verdurehood 

Of  young  and  vigorous  insight ;  and  would  speak 

Where  comprehension  can  accompany ; 

Not,  as  too  often,  a  derision,  coarse 

Or  keen  miscomprehension  of  my  mood.— 

Ay,  there  have  been  a  many  travelers  here, 

From  fame  of  my  fine  flowers  ;  hardly  one 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Whose  motive  to  admire  them  was  mine. 
There  have  been  many  minds  to  question  mine 
Concerning  management,  assistance  given 
To  planthood-needs  and  hopes ;  and  many  eyes 
To  feast  on  scarlet,  azure,  golden-pink, 
Purple  and  passion  of  the  great  leaves'  green; 
Yet  hardly  an  heart  intelligent  to  love.  — 
As  for  the  crude,  ill-educated  sort 
Who  gape  at  the  flame  of  the  foot-wide  petalling 
Call'd  poppy,  stare  the  larkspur's  azure  blind ; 
Fall-to  with  brush  and  pallet,  paint  my  garden 
For  an  arabesque  mosaic ;  go  away 
Cocksure  that  color  is  the  crux  of  things  — 
Nor  do  I  care,  that  they  'd  admit  space-form 
If  form  be  just  their  color's  diagram !  — 
I  take  small  comfort  from  such  artist-crumbs 
Of  human  character.    I  quarrel  not 
With  the  canvas'd  color-clots  they  carry  off 
To  frame  and  feast  on  ;  sooth,  their  color-plan 
Is  good  as  mine  in  the  garden  —  or,  if  better, 
Is  better  to  their  credit!    'T is  but  their  claim 
Of  ultimate  intelligence,  perception 

1 86 


A  HORTICULTURIST 

Of  pure  sensational  impression,  '  cause 
Of  all  that 's  real  in  thought ',  that  boils  my  blood  ! 
If  they  could  see  how  close  to  savagery 
Their  psychologic  fallacy  betrays  them ! 
Could  they  but  feel  how  the  creed's  consistency 
Would  carry  them  beneath  intelligence 
At  all,  down,  down  below  the  weeds  of  grass, 
Clean  beneath  loam  and  rocks  and  dust ;  how  *  sense ' 
If  sense  alone,  mere  '  color-scheme ',  were  quite 
Incapable  of  any  schematism : 
4  Felt  color ',  color  but  by  a  value  yielded 
In  each  concatenating  soul  of  us 
(In  their  souls  only  less  than  in  mine  own!); 
'  Sense '  therefore  real  but  in  sense'  self-transcension 
(If  elementally  as  a  manifold 
Of  photic  combination,  then  the  more 
By  meaning  the  flower-in-us,  the  leaf-in-us : 
And  this,  regardless  of  a  three  or  two 
Dimensions  in  such  language-of-the-eye !)  — 
If  they  could  grasp  this  fair  philosophizing  — 
Sure,  they  would  pause  in  the  painting,  grow  more 
worthy 

187 


EARLIER  POEMS 

The  wonder-beauty  of  the  world  they  flout  — 

The  world  they  not  intentionally,  indeed, 

Though  none  the  less  inexorably,  flout ; 

Deducing  '  consciousness '  from  *  spots  '  and  '  points ' 

Spotless  as  pointless  save  interpreted 

Language-like  to  a  purport,  at  the  last, 

Of  photic-couch'd  enthusiasms  of  soul : 

The  soul  inane  unless  by  sympathy 

Of  insight  universal,  thus  express'd  ! 

Pity,  that  most  of  those  who  visit  here 

Dabbling  in  color,  may  not  rest  content 

With  insight  yielded  to  the  spots  they  paint ; 

But  still  must  half-explain  it  all  away, 

The  planthood  with  our  manhood's  sympathy 

For  the  planthood  in  us.   Oh,  they  still  assert 

Their  objectivity  (quite  impossible 

Sans  object-insight!),  still  forswear  their  creed 

By  what  their  brush  creates ;  yet  scarce  explain 

How  a  comprehension  comes — themselves  but  spots, 

Blotches  of  hue  —  can  color  comprehend? — 

So  much  for  those  half-cultured  who  'd  deny 

The  intellect  that  makes  intelligent 

188 


A  HORTICULTURIST 

Even  its  degradation,  their  degree 

Of  stultification  —  let  them  paint  and  pry ! 

They  paint  fair  pictures  ;  guess  nor  why  nor  how.  — 

Then  there  come  others  of  the  science-brood : 

Psychologists  not  these,  but  physiologues 

Who  miss  the  meaning  much  as  painters  do ; 

If  yet,  as  by  inversion,  taking  heed 

Too  much  to  the  plant,  too  little  to  themselves, 

Fail  in  the  reconstruction  equally, 

Lacking  analogies  intuitive 

Despite  a  parade  and  pomp  and  circumstance 

Of  an  observation  absolute  supposed ! 

Yea,  they  are  wearisome  who  lay  such  claim 

To  the  final  verdict,  last  exactitude 

By  chemical  analysis  of  cells ! 

Ay,  analyse  back  to  a  primal  element  — 

One,  mark  you,  not  such  four-score  of  their  scheme— 

The  hypothetical  sub-hydrogen 

In  quantitative  self-complexities, 

Or  any  ion,  unit  what  's-its-name, 

For  quintessential  basis  of  their  cells  — 

Explain  you  anything ;  or,  haply,  state 

189 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Now  first  with  nicety,  exactitude 

The  problem  life-philosophy 's  to  solve  ?  — 

What  of  their  tissuey  nuclei  ?  I  grant 

Great  value  in  the  evolutionary, 

The  functional  comparisons  of  plant 

And  human  organism  though  each  express'd 

In  algebraic  signs,  atomic  symbols 

The  simplest  (so  the  most  inadequate) 

Of  common  terms  — for  a  proper  place  and  purpose 

In  tracing  continuities  throughout 

And  bases  for  the  felt  analogies 

Of  insight-sympathy  so  sub-defined  ; 

Not  for  their  purpose  of  reducing  plant 

And  man  alike  to  a  cell-nonentity  ! 

Prate  of  root-pressure,  ferment,  chlorophyll, 

Capillary-absorption,  permeation 

Wholly  accounted-for  by  mechanism, 

Contiguance  osmotic  cell  with  cell ! 

Sir,  what  would  all  their  cell-stuffs  in  the  world 

Be  cells  of,  cells  in  fact,  save  cells-of-plants ; 

The  plant  explaining  still  the  cell,  as  cell 

Some  least  explains  the  molecule,  as  man 

190 


A   HORTICULTURIST 

Explains  by  modified  analogy 

(A  modification  based  in  knowledge  of 

The  springs  of  action,  function  motivate) 

In  insight-sympathy  the  living  plant. 

For  otherwise  were  every  cell  the  same 

Whate'er  the  chemic  complex  (chemistry 

Itself  indifferent,  failing  reference 

To  the  over-planthood,  over-humanhood 

Criterial  of  the  contrasts) ,  plant  with  rock 

Clean  interchangeable,  and  man  at  best 

Mechanical  recorder,  comprehending 

Nor  rock  nor  plant,  nor  the  nature  of  himself — 

Which,  even  by  being  the  man-of-molecules, 

Conceives  and  so  demarks  both  plant  and  man 

In  terms  both  cellular-molecular 

And  vegetative-human  none  the  less. 

Cell-structure 's  nowise  structural  enough 

(Though  ne'er  so  chemic  in  the  last  resort!) 

To  render  comprehensibly  as  tissue 

The  least  elaborated  thallogen !  — 

The  chemic  fallacy  refutes  itself 

In  terms  of  protoplasm  —  preassumed 

191 


EARLIER   POEMS 

An  elementary  material 

Equipp'd  with  each  and  all  plant's  faculties 

Supposed  explain'd  by  reference  thereto!  — 

Thus  for  the  physiologues ;  they  'd  miss  the  mark 

Of  planthood  by  discovering  too  much  ; 

Rending  and  tearing  till  the  plant  lie  dead : 

Then  edifying  life  with  life's  remains! 

And,  for  the  better  botanists  who  class 

And  reclass  by  the  manner  of  each  frame's 

Resemblance,  theirs  is  mainly  but  to  aid 

(Save  also,  that  they  too  teach  relationships 

Of  stock  to  stock  in  outworn  ancestries) 

Memory's  nomenclature,  add  to  each 

Familiar  face  an  unforgotten  name  — 

A  worthy  way ;  but  still  beside  the  mark 

Of  best  appreciation  ;  and  yet  an  aid 

To  us  who  add  a  poetry  to  speech, 

Vivify  epithets,  both  name  and  know ! 

Remains  the  poet-knower,  I  or  you 
(With  chemic  erudition  well-equipp'd 
Toward  managing,  directing  planthood-hopes 

192 


A   HORTICULTURIST 

Whose  health-achievement,  novelty-success 

Sheer  color  advertises  to  the  eye!), 

Friend  and  befriended  of  the  patient  plants ; 

A  comprehension  and  intelligence 

Beyond  the  plants',  yet  yielding  planthood  voice 

Of  humanhood.  —  Not  as  from  human  tongue, 

The  plant  calPd  human  and  endow'd  with  speech ; 

No  such  crude,  antiquated  Grecianism, 

Conventional  inheritance  of  verse  ; 

But  selfhood  of  the  planthood  felt  in  me, 

Made  vocal  in  the  man,  appreciator !  — 

Friend,  I  have  spoken  of  myself  to  you, 

Of  the  planthood  in  me ;  making  poetry 

Of  the  mutualism.    Friend,  I  pray  you,  throw 

To  ash-heap  for  the  food  (not  flower  and  fruit) 

Of  life  in  you  these  sensuous-simple  points 

Of  the  colorist,  these  cells  —  save  for  their  union 

In  the  living  whole !  Sing  heart-philosophy 

Of  each  through  each,  so  sing  my  larkspurs  loud 

In  the  azureness  and  sap-fertility 

Of  rhythm,  sonorous  syllabling  of  self  ! 

Science  and  sentience,  bad  psychology 


193 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Are  the  poverty  of  intellect  of  those 

Who  pose  for  preachers  of  the  modernism 

(Of  a  color-gloating,  of  a  clinic-garden 

In  gardenless  disintegrance)  and  fain 

Make  idols  of  fact.  —  Friend,  why  not  truth  :  like  mine  ? 


194 


THE  PRIMA  DONNA 

AH,  but  I  laugh  that  weary,  happy  laugh 
Our  Browning  wrote  of ;  like  his  Herakles 
After  the  labor  and  accomplishment  — 
Husband  mine,  after  this  my  conquering 
You  quote  me  now,  their  outburst  of  applause ! 
'  The  great  tones  sung,  in  technic  perfected  ; 
Authoritative  ;  satisfaction  full ' ! 
Thus,  I  have  gain'd  mine  art's  acknowledgment ; 
Can  beg  a  respite,  steal  an  hour  for  learning 
To  understand  this  art  they  rave  about ; 
Comprehend  labor  and  victory  —  conquest  new  ?  • 
Friend,  for  what  end  the  labor  all  these  years  ? 
Is  it  that  in  me  something  wakes  beyond, 
Far  beyond,  in  and  through  the  conquest  here; 
Some  dim  suspicion  of  a  failure  lurk'd 
In  all  this  worship  loud  and  eminence  ? 
Failure,  save  understanding  yield  me  aid, 
End  comprehended  prove  end  earn'd  and  won  ? 
Ay,  for  't  is  mainly  they  applaud  the  voice ; 
The  song  but  little,  technic  rated  far 

195 


EARLIER   POEMS 

Above  mere  music  meant  in  every  note : 

The  strength  superb  and  sinew'd  mastery 

Of  the  thews,  their  admiration  ;  not  the  aim  — 

Lion  or  hydra,  death's  self,  overcome, 

Appropriated,  reconciled  with  life  ? 

Husband  !  What  if,  before  the  morning  wanes 

To  noon ;  ere  I  rouse  to  the  daily  stint 

Of  sheer  vocality  (you,  to  music's  work 

Genius'd,  creative)  — ah  !  what  if  we  two 

Couch 'd  happily  over  against  this  breakfast-hearth 

Philosophize  —  nay,  what  if  I  hold-forth 

From  throne  of  pettiness  preeminent, 

Instruct  the  man  of  genius  how  my  art  — 

Half-scorn'd,  sir  (nay,  in  heart !)  by  either  of  us  !  - 

How  this  my  failure  in  my  victory 

Proves  victory  over  failure  by  intent, 

Means  music  ;  ay,  despite  such  shameless  wrong 

Done  music  in  my  master'd  craftsmanship, 

My  plaudits  that  declass  the  genuine  crown 

Won,  worn  in  spirit,  husband,  by  your  soul 

(You  listening  patiently)  —  nor  fear  lest  I 

Catch  hoarsening  by  the  talk  !  I  could  not  sing 

196 


THE  PRIMA  DONNA 

To-night,  so  stirr'd  my  heart  is  by  this  false 

Tribute  to  technic  of  the  dabblers  there ; 

Ne'er  could  I  sing  save  some  relief  of  talk 

Intervene,  free  my  soul  from  scorn  of  self 

For  failing  (in  interpreter's-attempt) 

To  obliterate  the  interpreter,  efface 

Technic  in  triumph  of  interpreting's 

Transparency ;  for  triumphing  as  now 

Diva  and  brava,  what  you  will !  —  Ah,  husband ! 

Fancy  his  Herakles  exhibiting 

Muscles  and  sinews  to  the  sleeking  palm 

Of  pleased  Admetos,  purged  Augean  folk  ! 

'T  were  Herakles'  to  question  :  '  Next,  what  task  ? ' 

Yes,  and  what  task,  what  end  ?  You  know  the  end 
Best  in  your  brain ;  somewhat,  perchance,  in  the  song 
Conceived,   composed  of  the  manuscript.     But  see 

you 

(Your  work  has  craft,  but  of  a  nobler  kind  !) 
Song's  meaning  best  in  the  masteries  I  mouth 
By  any  virtue  of  their  mastery  ? 
Nay ;  in  your  heart,  though  half-articulate, 

197 


EARLIER  POEMS 

I  dare  discern  a  want :  *  This  voice  whose  speech 

Woman's,  divine  (being  my  wife's)  must  mean 

(As  I  mean  her  soul  by  each  song  conceived) 

My  soul,  must  still  intend  to  interpret  me  — 

The  husband,  understood,  made  one  by  love. 

Yet'  —  there  the  half-articulation  fades  ! 

Friend,  is  it  wife's-love  merely  that  should  seize 

And  speak  the  soul ;  subordinate  the  method 

By  worship  in  the  music,  every  note  ? 

Or  is  it  somewhat  in  you  (ah  !  in  me  !) 

Deeper  and  holier  that  demands  of  me  ?  — 

Well,  then,  for  the  mode  your  husband-love  assumes 

(Your  genius'  self-disguise)  which  would  support 

These  people  in  their  tribute  of  applause : 

'True  to  the  timbre  '  !  —  But — timbre's  criterion, 

Is  it  some  sensuous  analysis 

Of  how  tone  in  the  abstract,  tone  as  tone, 

Mere  tone  must  be,  to  be  tone-beautiful  ? 

Is  it,  conviction  springs  in  the  concave  vault 

Of  palate,  passages  to  a  nicety 

Adjusted  that  the  vibrant  resonance 

Assume  just  such  a  sort  of  resonance 

198 


THE  PRIMA  DONNA 

As,  entering  in,  tickles  appropriately 

To  the  ears'  formation,  fibre-sac  and  cell  ? 

So ;  but  are  nerve  and  sac  and  fibre  judge 

Of  sound's  heart-fitness ;  is  the  vibrant  vault 

Warrant  of  an  art-value  ?  Dubiously ; 

Being  themselves,  in  their  organic  gust, 

Not  only  life-subordinate  but,  even 

A  register  of  bygone  ways  ancestral 

In  taste  one-time  aesthetic  but  not  now 

Exemplary  of  our  soul-onwardness  — 

An  onwardness  which  form'd  or  sac  or  cell ; 

And  ever  modifies  despite  the  drag 

And  deadweight  of  their  frame  conservative, 

Whose  function  chiefly  were  to  keep  us  sane 

And  tame  unto  our  sociality  ! 

Whence,  if  the  tone  be  bound  to  please  the  ear 

Merely,  must  all  life-satisfying  lift 

Of  soul-conatus  be  denied  to  it, 

And  only  that  be  art  which  ancestors 

In  some  now-negligible  infant-age 

Of  the  earth  conceived  and  earnestly  put  forth, 

Maybe,  but  which  to  our  maturity 

199 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Must  prove  but  babbling.   And  the  physic-tone 

(Mere  air-vibration,  mark  !)  however  order'd 

(Be  it  ancestrally  by  structure-chance 

Or  by  deliberate  choice  of  men  to-day) 

To  abstract,  mathematic  unities 

Of  ratios  overtonic,  what  you  will 

Of  arithmetical  simplicities, 

Can  claim  authority  only  if  the  soul 

(A  pretext  which  appeals  to  you  nor  me) 

Should  dwell  in  an  indolence  for  sweetness'  sake 

And  fain  eschew  a  strenuous  nobleness  ! 

'T  is  well,  to  know  whereby  the  bland  be  bland 

Of  structure ;  though  to  choose,  for  strength  of 

choice  !  — 

Remains  what  ?  Just  this  genius  of  you  there 
Filter'd  and  fritter'd  someway  through  my  voice 
To  ears  and  brains  and  souls  agape  of  them : 
No  emptiest,  aural  yearning,  no,  nor  sample 
Authentic  of  the  laboratory-tone, 
But  tone-expression  —  self  alive  for  song  ! 
Fancy  his  Herakles  cutting  out  some  thew, 
Slashing  and  slicing  sinews,  muscles  so 


200 


THE  PRIMA  DONNA 

That  each  might  be  admired  more  overtwise, 

Each  obtain  due  share  of  the  mob's  remark, 

Ere  it  undertake  a  fresh  strain  presently  ! 

Where,  then,  were  muscle,  sinew  for  the  work  ? 

Nay,  he  knew  well  each  muscle's  ministry 

In  the  man ;  as  I,  each  tone's  unto  the  song  ! 

'Tis  the  appropriateness  of  sound  to  meaning 

(Muscle  with  sinew  interwove  to  bear 

Pressure  precise  to  the  point  the  man's  whole  self 

Wills)  based  best  in  departure  from  the  gust 

Of  merely  ear  as  ear,  if  masterfully 

Whole  —  't  is  the  mastery's  self-subordinance  — 

That  yields  voice  to  your  music ;  nowise  mine  ! 

Ah  !  but  my  'soul's  original  research, 

Basis  and  background  of  interpreting '?  — 

Insofar  as  bent,  grasp  and  insight  all, 

To  comprehension  of  your  wonder-mood, 

Perfect  interpreter  I  well  may  seem  ! 

But,  grant,  the  rank  sinew,  overweening,  thwart 

The  will  of  the  hero ;  insofar  as  thus 

Self -thwarted,  then  no  hero  and  no  task  !  — 

Technic,  essential  —  to  effacing  it ! 

201 


EARLIER   POEMS 

But  my  tirade  yet  bears  an  inference 

E'en  beyond  aught  of  Browning's  Herakles  ! 

(E'en  beyond,  friend,  your  inmost  fear  for  me !) 

I'm  but  a  stop-gap ;  Herakles,  heroic 

Not  solely  for  a  mastery-muscular 

Of  world,  of  death  ;  ah,  more  for  the  presaging, 

A  prophecy  in  him,  of  heroes  new, 

Of  mastery  more  complex,  conquering 

To  some  task's  end  more  worldly-intimate ; 

Some  self-expression  in  and  through  more  means 

Than  muscles  merely  ;  some  philosopher, 

Elucidator,  artist  like  to  you  ! 

Where  were  the  value  to  our  modern  world 

(Nay,  even  to  a  post-heroic  classic-age 

Poetic  as  we  are  also  musical !) 

Of  a  latter  Herakles ;  save  Herakles 

Embrace  modernity  ?    No  muscle  now 

Finds  ultimate  tasks,  regenerative  aims 

Work'd  through  thews,  sinews  merely !  —  For  this  once 

Let  me  show  prophecy,  show  forth  my  spirit 

In  depths  beyond  mere  prima-donnaship 

(Even  though  deeply  soul's  interpreter): 

202 


THE  PRIMA   DONNA 

More  worthy  to  be  mated  through  your  own ! 

Where  find  you  music  most  ?    In  the  vibrant  voice 

Ne'er  so  entrancing  (nay,  ne'er  so  intent 

With  sense-subordinance  !);  in  voice  of  mine 

At  height  of  soul-interpreting  ?   Or  then 

When  in  the  silent,  sense-immediate 

Brain  the  vast  beauty  bursts  of  issuant  song 

Unvoiced,  yet  self-articulant  indeed  ; 

Made  manuscript,  maybe ;  yielded  to  me 

To  lift  and  thrill  and  all-transfuse  me  through 

With  wonder  and  worship  of  imagined  sound, 

Perfectly  plastic,  truth-determined  then  ? 

Miscomprehend  me  not !   Stand  I  and  sing, 

Add  I  to  the  music-marvel  hints  of  charm, 

I  allow  —  not  music's,  not  the  mind's  that  sang 

In  vision,  but  visibly  —  women's ;  at  the  best 

Extraneous,  adventitious ;  at  the  worst 

(Look  to  worse  women  !)  art-detestable  ! 

Ah  !  were  the  sweat  and  reeking  of  the  god 

Good,  best,  themselves,  or  only  by  default 

Of  some  great  engine  to  envelop  death, 

Crush  and  o'erpower  —  man-directed  still, 


203 


EARLIER  POEMS 

Conceived,  invented,  executed;  man's 

Multiple-marvel  of  effectiveness 

For  just  the  purpose,  end  and  aim  of  the  task  ? 

An  *  instrumentation  ',  you  'd  aver  ?   Not  quite ; 

Save  as  a  second  stop-gap  ;  halfway  stage 

Through  mere  mechanic  enginery  toward  strength 

Of  the  logical  positing,  a  forensic  lore 

Surpassing  in  the  self-projection ;  speech 

Of  poesy  (ay,  and  of  music)  genius-made : 

Fit  to  transcend  even  death,  made  death-through-life  ! 

Instrumentation  ?    Insofar  a  step 

From  the  extraneous,  personal  appeal 

Of  mere  interpreter  soul-ill-at-ease, 

(Never,  not  once  purely  interpreting 

The  maker's  meaning)  —  riddance,  in  some  least 

Degree,  of  mediator  yet  in  kind 

Originator  and  confuser  so  !  — 

His  Herakles  were  poet  possibly  !  — 

Stands  poesy  now,  intoned  in  pulpit,  droned 

At  tableside,  spouted  above  the  pit 

Poesy,  as  in  the  ante-music  age 

Of  troubadour,  of  rhapsode  chanting  it  — 

204 


THE   PRIMA  DONNA 

Poesy  ?    Or  poesy  most,  silently  sent 

From  brain  through  brain  by  symbol'd  syllabling  ? 

1  The  silent  symbol  still  a  mediator '  ? 

No;  no  !   The  syllabling  in  the  poet's  soul 

Speaks  not  save  soul-included,  comprehended 

(In  such  sort  as  your  reader  may  attain)  — 

Except  for  sight's  absorption  of  the  types  — 

Sans  mediation's  externality : 

The  meaning-in-the-sound —  the  poet-pure  — 

Taken  up,  reproduced,  identified 

In  my  mind-substantive,  meaning-in-sound 

Of  mine ;  suggested,  straight  interpreted 

Even  by  the  interpreter's  obliterance  — 

The  symbols  nowise  spoken,  no,  nor  heard  ! 

1  Understood  but  by  previous  mediance 

Call'd  education  '?  — Mediate  previously, 

Not  now  as  contemporary  with  the  song ; 

But  inborn,  made  immediate  instantly  ! 

I  leave  the  elucidation  to  some  seer 

More  versed  in  dialectic  lore  than  me, 

More  capable  of  tracing  point  by  point 

Thought's  infinite  labyrinths  —  I  dogmatize ; 

205 


EARLIER   POEMS 

State  you  the  truth  with  just  enough  of  truth's 

Elaboration  self-explanatory 

To  satisfy  my  soul  if  scarce  convince  you ; 

I  appeal  in  faith  just  to  the  faith  in  you, 

Leave  law  to  lawyers'  pleading.  'T  is  your  song 

Unsung,  made  manuscript,  so  silently 

Symbolized  to  self-syllabling  that  springs 

Direct,  transcendent,  satisfying,  whole 

In  the  soul  of  me,  made  one  with  yours  by  love ; 

Love,  through  love's  most  elaborate  symphonies 

Identifiable  in  song ! 

I  'sing 

To-night  again  '  ?    Nay,    '  cancel  the  contract,  seek 
Respite  for  nerves  so  set  at  odds  with  fact '  ? 
Ha  ?  Have  I  frighten'd  you ;  the  pulse,  the  eye 
Flush 'd,  fever'd  in  me  ?    I  admit  some  glow 
Of  indignation  godlike  against  ways 
So  pitiful,  so  unlike  music's  !    '  Mistress 
Of  song,  indeed  ' !  —  Ah  !    but  the  end  in  view 
(Realized  through  the  soul's  revolt  from  such  applause! ), 
Mine  aim  that  dignifies  the  technic,  lends 
More  than  interpreter 's-efficiency 

206 


THE  PRIMA  DONNA 

To  mediation  ;  and  presages  thus 

The  mightier  music  of  the  printed  page, 

The  limitless  fresh  opportunity 

For  multiple-symphony  —  once  the  subtleties 

Step  by  step  but  familiarized  through  ear, 

Made  comprehensible  !  —  that  now  I  sing 

My  simpler-sensuous  melodies ;  make  mine  art 

Didactic  for  a  purpose ;  teach  and  try 

To  make  intelligible  the  music-mode 

Bit  by  bit  to  the  loves  and  lives  of  them, 

These  people  with  their  music-moved  applause, 

Who  know  not  what  they  do  !  —  Husband  of  mine, 

Herakles  prophesied  Euripides ; 

Presaged  our  very  Browning's  genius-piece ! 


207 


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